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After leatfj— 




C..pyri:-:!it by Mi.-hkin 



MADISON C. PETERS. D.D. 



After Death- What? 



A Scholarly Exposition of a Vitally Interesting 

Question That Has Deeply Agitated 

Thinking Men and Women 

from Time Immemorial 



BY 

MADISON C. PETERS, D.D. 

Author of "THE GREAT HEREAFTER," Etc. 



fa fork 

THE CHRISTIAN HERALD 
LOUIS KLOPSCH, Proprietor 
92 to 116 BIBLE HOUSE 



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LIBRARY of CONGRESS J 
Two Coo'ies Received 

DEC 3 19G8 

Copynent Entry n 

CLASS Ou KXc. No, 

^ COPY 8. 



Copyright, 1908, by Louis Klopsch 



And he, shall he, 

Man, her last work who seem'd so fair, 
Such splendid purpose in his eyes, 
"Who roll'd the psalm to wintry skies, 
Who built him fanes of fruitless prayer> 

"Who trusted God was love indeed 
And love Creation's final law— 
Tho ' Nature, red in tooth and claw 
"With ravine, shriek 'd against his creed — 

Who lov'd, who suffer 'd countless ills, 
Who battled for the True, the Just, 
Be blown about the desert dust, 
Or sealed within the iron hills? 

No more I A monster then, a dream, 
A discord. Dragons of the prime, 
That tare each other in their slime, 
Were mellow music match 'd with him. 

— Alfred Tennyson, 



\ 



PREFACE 



The work here presented to the public is the 
result of many years of thought, reading and 
preaching upon the subject. Whittier speaks of 
the grave as 

"that low green tent 
Whose curtain never outward swings." 

Millions have gone through the gate of death, and 

while we have given the hopes which the poets 

have woven into a song, and the attempts of the 

philosophers to penetrate the veil of mystery 

that lies beyond, we have portrayed the after life 

as we learned it by the study of God's Eevelation. 

We have presented reason's strong presumption, 

not only in favor of immortality, but of heavenly 

recognition also, in support of which we have 

sought and found full light in the Gospel. 

The reader will find interesting things from 

the wise of the ages, and sit at the feet of the 

poets, the interpreters of the human heart — the 

expounders of its mysteries, but in every instance 

the Bible has been our court of final appeal. We 

do not share the popular opinion that we are in 

9 



PREFACE 

the dark with regard to "The Life Beyond.' ' 
We have avoided speculation and have earnestly 
sought to declare the positive teachings of Chris- 
tianity, to throw God's light on dark clouds, to 
cheer the desponding, to comfort the bereaved, 
and inspire the readers with the holy ambition 
to live here in such a way that they may be sure 
of the life to come. 

MADISON C. PETERS. 
New York, December, 1908. 



SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I 
Does Death End All? 

PAGE 

Immortality a universal belief. — Found not only among 
cultured nations, but all the world around, 
among all peoples from the world's earliest morn- 
ing — This feeling that there is a hereafter the coun- 
terpart of reality — Man is the only creature having 
this religious instinct, therefore immortality must be 
the end to which it leads — When death comes it 
brings to all men conscious assurance of immortal- 
ity — Man's restless spirit, proof of Immortality — 
Man alone carries with him a heavy heart — Im- 
mortality the only satisfactory explanation — The 
soul immaterial, therefore immortal — The future life 
necessary to vindicate God's character — The inde- 
structibility of matter — Immortality's influence on 
conduct — The one nation and only one that ever 
tried to destroy a belief in God and immortality — 
A future life needed for the working out of that 
moral completeness which the present never brings — 
The love that lightens life acts instinctively on the 
hypothesis of eternity 21 

CHAPTER II 

What Has the Old Testament to Say Upon the 

Life Beyond? 

The Bible finds us as nothing else. — Immortality an 
everpresent underlying fact which runs like a golden 
thread from Genesis to Revelation — From the very 
first page of the Pentateuch immortality of the soul 
was a principle well known and fully understood — 
How the Old Testament draws the distinction be- 
tween the spirit and the flesh — The old Jews who 
lived together in life, wished to live together in 
death, as they hoped to rise together on the Resur- 
rection and to dwell together in everlasting habita- 
tions — Ancient Hebrews regarded life as a journey, 

11 



SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

as a pilgrimage — The practice of magical invoca- 
tions of the dead, positive proof of the popular belief 
in continued existence of the departed — David's deep 
convictions of immortality — Job's clear convic- 
tions — Solomon acknowledged the dualism of man's 
nature — The distinct utterance of Daniel— The Tal- 
mud on immortality — Proof positive that knowl- 
edge of immortality is older than the Gospel — Christ 
lifted the old conception out of probability into the 
realm of assurance 55 

CHAPTER III 
A Comforting Belief 

Belief that death ends all would make the present exist- 
ence a nightmare of horor — Immortality alone 
amid life's pains can comfort the soul — The happi- 
ness derived from our faith in immortality is in 
proportion to the strength and determination we call 
forth to live the immortal life here — Faith must ever 
burn with incandescent glow — Too many hold the 
solemn verities of the hereafter in a sort of half 
consciousness — There must be faith in Christ as the 
Redeemer before we can feel the power of immor- 
tality — Your light affliction works for you a far 
more exceeding and eternal weight of glory — The 
night of death, the dawn of a clearer day — Immor- 
tality essential to every hope inspired by religion — 
Man too great to be cabined, cribbed and confined 
by earth's narrow limits — Take away the hope in- 
spired by faith in immortality and naught would 
remain to make life worth living — No time when 
the consoling powers of the truth of immortality 
come with such comfort as in the time of death . 81 

CHAPTER IV 

Light After Darkness 

Man's earthly life a checkered scene — What men call 
death is simply a change — The shower as necessary 
as the sunshine — Only after storm can we fittingly 
relish the calm — Affliction no respecter of persons — 
Your cross no heavier than that of others — Sorrow 
rounds out and perfects life — Jacob and Paul con- 
trasted — How the latter's faith took hold of things 
through the eyes of the Spirit, while Jacob failed 
to see the Divine Plan, that in the end, seemingly 
the worst, was for his best — Your trust in God 

12 



SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS 



PAGE 



keeps you from sinking — No afflicted believer has 
ever gone in the dark hour to his Saviour for sup- 
port and been disappointed — The deepest happiness 
is not that which has never suffered — The sweetest 
songs of earth have been sung in sorrow — Keep your 
hold on God, come what may — Keep toiling on for 
others' sake 103 

CHAPTER V 

A Symposium on Immortality 

Best thoughts from the world's greatest thinkers — T. C. 
Coleridge — Lord-Chancellor Erskine — John Fiske — s 
Dr. Lionel Beale — Dr. John Bascom — Dr. Mar^ 
tineau — Dr. N. S. Shaler — Dr. George Gordon^ 
Dr. Brooke Herford — The Duke of Argyle — Frances 
Power Cobbe — Victor Hugo — Thomas Carlyle — Ly= 
man Abbott — Dr. Newman Smythe — Dr. Theodore 
Munger — R. W. Emerson — Dr. Salmond — Dr. S. Dc 
McConnell — George Romanes — Prof. Wm. James — 
Johann W. von Goethe— H. W. Thomas, D.D.— Wil- 
liam Trail — Seneca — Bishop Randolph S. Foster — 
Joseph Cook — Henry Ward Beecher — George R. 
Wendling — Dr. Amory Bradford — Prof. Goldwin 
Smith — Washington Gladden — Daniel March — Wil- 
liam Jennings Bryan — Prof. Harnack .... 125 

CHAPTER VI 

The Soul Between Death and Resurrection 

The Scriptural expressions which strengthen the belief 
that the souls of men do not in the period which 
intervenes between their separation from the body 
and the general resurrection sink into a condition of 
lifeless torpor, but are conveyed to some abode and 
retain their active powers, at no distant period, but 
on the very day of death are conveyed to heaven — 
No intermediate place but an intermediate state — 
The full apocalypse of God is not given, but for 
every believer's soul there is immediate bliss, but in 
a disembodied state and, therefore, intermediate — 
No purgatory in the early Christian church — Absent 
from the body and present with the Lord — The 
meaning of sleep in all languages — Death the gate 
of life — There is a judgment when a man dies, but. 
a still further judgment on the last great day when 
a public decision shall be made — The balance swings 
unevenly here, but these inequalities we now behold 
13 



SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

will then be balanced to an unerring nicety — Then 
it will appear as it never could have done here that 
God is both a God of justice and goodness . . . 173 

CHAPTER VII 

Our Children in Heaven 

To none do our hearts go out in greater longing than to 
the little ones who have gone before — Every object 
associated with them is sacred — The future estate 
of the children a subject of deep anxiety to many — 
Unreasonable and unscriptural views which have 
been taught — The little ones gain rest without 
labor, victory without conquest— The superstitions 
regarding infant baptism — Baptism does not im- 
part a new heart — Enlightened Christianity coming 
to an united belief that baptism does not insure 
regeneration and, therefore, all infants are saved — 
The children whom God has taken away are our 
permanent possessions — The invisible children be- 
come the dearest children — How the child's death 
brings new blessings to the home — When Christian 
faith rules the life, the child, though brief the stay, 
will not have come in vain 199 

CHAPTER VIII 

Our Heavenly Home 

Glimpses of the coming world — Descriptions of heaven 
are figurative, yet they serve to give us some knowl- 
edge of our heavenly home — All that heaven means 
is beyond our finite comprehension — The conceal- 
ment of heaven — A full revelation would unfit us 
for the duties of the present world — Why a full 
vision is denied us — Heaven is largely unknown be- 
cause it transcends and not because it is unreal — 
Heaven is a place — The glorified must have a local 
platform for their future habitation — Where is 
heaven — The four words the Bible uses to describe 
heaven — a kingdom, a country, a city and a 
home — No sects in heaven — Heaven an open door — 
The revelation of immortality satisfies every want . 217 

CHAPTER IX 
What is Heaven and How to Reach It 

Pagan ideas of heaven, ancient and modern — Apostolic 
symbols — No pain in heaven — No hunger there; no 

14 



SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

sighs of farewell — The absence of sickness, no 
darkness yonder — The mysteries all revealed — How 
to reach heaven — Heaven a continuity, a develop- 
ment — Heaven means holiness 247 

CHAPTER X 

What Shall We Do in Heaven; 

Man never reaches a conclusion here — He dies when he 
gets ready to live — When the trammels of the body 
are thrown off, the Spirit unloosed will find full 
opportunity to realize its aspirations in a better 
sphere — Yonder we shall round out the life and 
attain our ambitions — Examples of great intellects 
who expressed their desire for another life that 
they might realize their ideals — Heaven is not a 
place of idleness, and psalm singing merely — What 
the heavenly rest means — Scripture symbols which 
signify that heaven will be a place of endless enter- 
prise and boundless progress — What work can be 
accomplished in this limitless hereafter — The great 
Work-giver will assign work commensurately to the 
degree of qualification it necessitates — An im- 
portant branch of the occupations of heaven will 
be the solution of the mysteries of the present life — 
In the long-forever we shall plan and work 
eternally, and learn profounder truths than we 
ever dreamt of here 269 

CHAPTER XI 

Shall We Know Each Other There ? 

The natural answer, Yes! — A world-wide belief — The 
heavenly recognition among the Greeks and Ro- 
mans — Modern heathen beliefs — All Christian 
creeds believe it — The belief among the primitive 
Christians — Revelation and recognition — The con- 
tinuance of memory in the world to come — Individ- 
ual friendships perpetuated — Love's demand for 
heavenly recognition — Love indestructible — Richer 
for having loved altho' we lost — Adoniram Jud- 
son's romance — The loved of long ago will gather 
about us and meet us at the landing , 305 

CHAPTER XII 
Poems of Comfort 

Blessed Are They That Mourn, William Cullen Bryant — 
Household Voices, John Greenleaf Whittier — Com- 
15 



SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS 



PAGE 



pensation, Christopher Pearse Cranch — The Angel 
of Patience, John Greenleaf Whittier — The Parting 
Hour, Edward Pollock — How Long? Horatius Bonar 
— Lights and Shades, Mrs. F. D. Hemans — Thy 
Way — Daily Strength, Frances Ridley Havergal — ■ 
The Rift in the Clouds, Laurenstine Yorke — No Cross 
Borne in Vain, J. G. Whittier — Spin Cheerfully — 
A Silvery Light for Every Cloud — Trust and Sub- 
mission, Andrew Norton — Leona, James Allen 
Clark — Sweet, Sweet Hope! Horatius Bonar — To 
Myself, Translation of Catherine Winkworth — The 
Heavenly Sculptor, Thomas C. Upham — God's Sure 
Help in Sorrow, From the German of Anton Ulrich, 
Duke of Brunswick, 1667, Translation of Catherine 
Winkworth, 1855 , , , . 347 

CHAPTER XIII 

The Tearless Land 

The Tearless Land, John H. Yates — The Undiscovered 
Country, Edmund Clarence Stedman — The Answer, 
Anon — Beyond, Mrs. J. E. Akers — The One Glad 
Day, Frederick D. Huntington — There is Light Be- 
yond, Anon — What Must it be to be There? Mrs. 
Elizabeth Mills — The Circle Complete, Edward 
Henry Bickersteth — I See Thee Still, Charles 
Sprague , 365 

CHAPTER XIV 
Reunions in Heaven 

The Family in Heaven, James Edmeston — My Dead, 
Frederick L. Hosmer — Soon With Thee, From the 
German of /. Lange — Longing for Reunion, H. K. 
White — Light at Eventide — Recognition in the 
Resurrection, Bishop Mant — The Departure of 
Friends, James Montgomery — The Radiant Shore — 
Over the River, Nancy Priest 377 

Index of Authors, 387 

First Lines of Poems or of Poetical Quotations, . 395 



Does Death End All? 



Mark how yon clouds in darkness ride, 
They do not quench the orb they hide; 
Still there it wheels, the tempest o'er, 
In the bright sky to burn once more : 
So, far above the clouds of time, 
Faith can behold a world sublime; 
Then when the storms of life are past, 
The light beyond shall break at last. 

— Charles Sprague. 



If a man die shall he live again? — Job. 

This world is not conclusion; 
A sequel stands beyond, 
Invisible as music, 
But positive as sound. 

— Emily Dickinson. 

We do not believe in immortality because we have proved 
it, but we forever try to prove it because we believe it. 

— Martineau. 

I feel my immortality o'ersweeps 

All pains, all tears, all time, all fears and peals 

Like the eternal thunders of the deep, 

Into my ears this truth, — "Thou liv'st forever." 

— Byron. 

The grave itself is but a covered bridge leading from light 
to light through a brief darkness. — Longfellow. 

O, may I join the choir invisible 

Of those immortal dead who live again 

In minds made better by their presence, live 

In pulses stirred to generosity, 

In deeds of daring rectitude, and in scorn 

For miserable aims that end with self, 

In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars, 

And with their mild persistence urge man's search 

To vaster issues. — George Eliot. 

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place 

The flood may bear me far, 

I hope to see my Pilot face to face 

When I have crossed the Bar. — Tennyson. 



After Death— What ? 



CHAPTER I 
Does Death End All? 

From the world's earliest morning the thoughts 
of man linked life to a longer chain of time than 
that between the cradle and the grave. We find 
everywhere what Emerson calls " man's andacious 
belief in a future life. ' ' " In the minds of all men, 
or wherever man appears," says the sage of Con- 
cord, "this belief appears with him, — in the sav- 
age savagely, in the pure purely." John Fiske, 
in Myths and Myth Makers, says: "The idea of 
death is something impossible for the primitive 
mind to entertain. ' ' 

Let us single out Egypt, the world's early school 
of the arts and sciences, the first leader of the 
world. What do we find among this primitive 
people ? A faith in immortality, which was not a 
mere hypothesis, but as Schlegel was forced to 
admit, "a lively certainty like the feelings of one's 
own being. ' ' The constructive power of the faith 

21 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

in immortality originated the Egyptian art of em- 
balming. The astonishing pyramids are enduring 
structures which faith has erected to the memory 
of immortal beings. And, if according to Carlyle, 
living with hope of immortality is derived from 
the nobility of man, then must the old tenants of 
Egypt, the master-minds who did so much thinking 
for the world for all times, have been a noble race. 

That the future life is but a shadow of the pres- 
ent, is the idea that runs through Homer, who 
lived about nine hundred years before Christ. 
What noble and elevated conceptions of life in 
the spirit world Socrates gives us five hundred 
years before Christ ! What an argument in Plato 's 
"Phaedon" to demonstrate immortality — the pro- 
foundest reason ever produced! Pindar, fore- 
runner of Plato, Pericles, who gave his name to 
the Golden Age of Athens, the shining splendor of 
Pythagoras, Sophocles and iEschylus, — all bear 
witness to the thought of Democritus, who said: 
"The soul is the house of God." 

That man lived on somehow or other, were it 
only in the melancholy shadow of existence, was 
the general idea ever since there was a Greek 
people. Marcus Aurelius and Scipio Africanus 
responded to the dictum of Epictetus; "Every 
man carries about in him a god. ' ' 

22 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

Not only among the cultured nations do we find 
this sentiment. It has fonnd its way into the South 
Sea Islands and those of the Pacific. It has 
diffused itself over Lapland, Asia and Africa. 

Livingstone in his travels tells us of old Chin- 
sunse\s belief: "We live only a few days here, 
but we live again after death; we do not know 
where, or in what condition, or with what com- 
panions, for the dead never return to tell us. 
Sometimes the dead do come back and appear to 
us in our dreams ; but they never speak, nor tell us 
where they have gone, nor how they fare. ' ' 

The chiefs of the Friendly Islands believed that 
the soul at death is immediately conveyed in a 
canoe to a distant country, called Doobludha. 

The followers of Confucius regard the departed 
as capable of giving aid to the meritorious of their 
progeny, and also inflicting vengeance on the 
unworthy. 

The Fijians believed that the state of a man 
after death would be identical in every way with 
that in which he died. 

When an Arab died his finest camel was tied to 
a stake beside his grave, and left to expire on the 
body of his master, in order that he might be fur- 
nished with his habitual mountage in the region to 
which death had introduced him. 

23 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Why in that forest grave, around which plumed 
and painted warriors stand unmoved and immov- 
able as statues, do they bury with the body of the 
Indian chief his canoe and bow and arrow? He 
goes to follow the chase and hunt the deer in the 
spectre-land, where the Great Spirit lives and the 
spirits of his fathers have gone before him. 
Some tribes lighted fires on the grave that the 
departed might not journey in the dark. 

Among the Seneca Indians when a maiden died 
they had a custom of imprisoning a young bird 
until it first began to try its powers of song. Then 
loading it with messages and caresses, they loosed 
its bonds over her grave, in the belief that it would 
neither fold its wings, nor close its eyes until it 
had flown to the spirit-land and delivered its 
precious burden of affection to the loved and lost. 

In one form or another, however distorted or 
misshapen, however steeped in savagery or sunk 
in superstition, the idea of a future life persists 
universally and outlasts all kinds of vehicles that 
seemed to contain it. 

Like some river of water of life flowing cease- 
lessly through the universal heart of humanity, it 
seems to say, — 

Men may come and men may go, 
But I go on forever. 

24 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

What is this intimation of immortality, this pro- 
foundest of all intuitions, this most ineradicable 
of all instincts, which lives ever on, renewing its 
youth, rising up from the ashes of dead fires, as 
an angel voice that sings on, above all the din of 
superstition, the degradations and miseries, the 
follies and fears of life? What is it, if it is not 
the testimony of God speaking in the heart of the 
child, the whisper of heaven, claiming for its own 
this thing of earth? 

Cicero long since said: "In everything the 
consent of all nations is to be accounted the law of 
nature, and to resist it is to resist the voice of 
God." An error never perpetuates itself. False- 
hood has no inherent recuperative energy. Error 
alone is sectional. Bryant says : ' ' Error wounded 
writhes in pain and dies amidst its worshipers." 

Where do we go to find out what is truth, but to 
concurrent human testimony? All men cannot be 
deceived, therefore, immortality is a reality. A 
belief so universal, so entirely agreeable to our 
feelings, so accordant with our reason, so inde- 
pendent of education, so uninfluenced by differ- 
ences of culture, antecedents and surroundings, 
cannot be false and misleading. 

This belief is clearly not the result of education. 
It could not have originated with man, nor have 

25 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

come to him from without. It must proceed, 
therefore, from a supreme moral intelligence. It 
has its foundation in the inward predisposition of 
our mental and moral constitution, implanted 
there by God himself. This feeling that there is 
a hereafter, this intuitiveness is the counterpart 
of reality, just as the reflection of a face in the 
water is sufficient evidence that the face itself is 
not an illusion. The idea of immortality is inter- 
woven with the mind, it is a part of the soul's orig- 
inal furniture; it is God's appointed witness that 
we shall live again. 

Man is the only creature that has this religious 
instinct ; therefore immortality must be the end to 
which it leads. If man has an instinct looking 
forward to future life, and there is no future life 
provided for him, then he is the solitary exception 
to a rule otherwise universal. 

There is no example in nature of an organic 
instinct without its correlate. Where do we see 
an instance of a creature instinctively craving a 
certain kind of food in a place where no such food 
can be found 1 

When the swallows' instinct causes them to fly 
away from clouds and storms to seek a warmer 
country, do they not actually find a milder climate 
beyond the sea? Nature never utters false proph- 

26 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

ecies. And if this be true with regard to the 
impulses of physical life, why should it not be true 
with regard to the superior instincts of the soul? 
Want is a prophecy of destiny. As Schiller puts 
it: "Was der Geist versprecht leistet die Natur;" 
what the spirit promises Nature performs. 

Addison clearly portrays the philosophical mind 
of Cato in the following lines, as sublime in expres- 
sion as in depth of reasoning : 

It must be so, Plato, thou reason'st well, 

Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 

This longing after immortality? 

Or whence this secret dread and inward horror 

Of falling into nought? Why shrinks the soul 

Back on herself and startles at destruction? 

'Tis the divinity that stirs within us, 

'Tis heaven itself that points out a hereafter, 

And intimates eternity to man. 

Must we believe that God has raised these hopes 
to crush them? No! assuredly not! It is not 
conceivable of a wise and loving Father that when 
we are ready to burst out into songs of love and 
wonder, our lips are to be forever sealed. Why 
are we endowed with this intense clinging to our 
own conscious personal life if maybe to-morrow or 
surely in a few years we shall be snuffed out like a 
candle ? 

If I believed that I was to behold nothing but 
the earthly scene of the eternal drama, and when 
my spirit was wrapt in anxiety I must perish in 

27 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

suspense, I should curse the day that gave me 
birth, I should never smile again, I should go 
weeping through life. 

Is immortality a dream? Let me dream on. I 
am content. 

Yes, if 'twere only a dream, 
Better it were to clasp it, 
Brood on it until it seem 
Real as the lines that grasp it. 

With Eichard Henry Stoddard we sing our con- 
fidence in God as the guardian of man's immor- 
tality: 

The life of man 

Is an arrow's flight, 

Out of darkness into light, 

And out of light into darkness again, 

Perhaps to pleasure — 

Perhaps to pain. 

There must be something, 

Above or below — 

Somewhere unseen 

A mighty Bow, 

A Hand that tires not, 

A Sleepless Eye 

That sees the arrows 

Fly and fly; 

One who knows 

Why we live, — and die. 

Why is it that when death comes it seems to 
bring with it to all men conscious assurance of 
immortality? When men go out of life they let go 
their doubts and sweep into the satisfying faith of 
a hereafter. 

On his death-bed a professed atheist requested 
to be buried by the side of his Christian wife and 

28 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

daughter. When asked why, his response was: 
"If there be a resurrection of the righteous, they 
will get me up somehow or other and take me 
with them. ' ' This little incident reveals the heart 
of man, tells the story of an immortal soul and 
voices our common hope. 

Nothing overwhelms man's soul like the pro- 
posal, — "lie in dull oblivion and to rot." 

"All men," says Theodore Parker, "desire to 
be immortal." They cling to life because they 
love it. They shrink from death, not on account 
of the pangs of dying, or of the results that follow, 
but because they dread the thought of going out 
of existence — of being dead. "What is this love of 
life and this fear of death but the natural expres- 
sion of that conviction of personal immortality 
which the inspiration of God breathed into the 
human spirit? The sentiment of the race by its 
evident longing for another life finds echo in the 
lines of Tennyson: 

No life that breathes with human breath 
Has ever truly longed for death. 

Man's Restless Spirit — Proof of Immortality 

Life is worth living. It is only mean to the 
man that makes it so. Yet, without being guilty 
of either ingratitude or pessimism we may assert 
that it fails to satisfy the deepest cravings of the 

29 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

heart. Expectation, and not satisfaction, seems 
to be all that even the most favored ever find 
on earth. 

The world exhausted itself on Solomon ; he was 
a multi-millionaire; his Empire stretched from 
the Euphrates to the Mediterranean, from the foot 
of Lebanon bordering on the desert and around 
to Egypt ; he was the encyclopedia of his age ; he 
lived in a palace which required fifteen and a-half 
years to complete; he had forty thousand horses 
for chariots. The style of grandeur in which he 
lived almost passed credence, yet he pronounced 
all vanity. 

Queen Elizabeth, proud queen of a mighty 
realm, with three thousand dresses in her ward- 
robe, had enough, one would think, to make any 
woman happy, but she was far from happy. From 
her dying couch comes the cry, — " Millions of 
money for an inch of time." If that offer had 
been possible, how it would have revolutionized 
financial affairs for a time ! 

Crowns may be set "with diamonds or Indian 
stones," but the kings and queens seldom enjoy 
the crown of content which is worn upon the 
heart. Do you imagine that the great heart of 
Abraham Lincoln ever found a moment's happi- 
ness in the White House? 

30 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

Thackeray, one of the most genial and lovable 
souls, after he had won the applause of all intelli- 
gent lands by his marvelous genius, sits down in 
a Paris restaurant, looks at the other end of 
the room and wonders whose that forlorn and 
wretched-looking face before him is. Eising he 
finds that it is Thackeray in a mirror. 

Man's soul is fluttering within like a caged bird, 
the noblest creature on the earth, and at the same 
time the most miserable. He has greater gifts 
and higher qualities than any other visible being, 
and yet he, and only he, is lonely and dejected, sad 
and sorrowful. 

Man alone carries with him a heavy heart. How 
merrily sing the birds as they fly along over the 
fields and forests, or cleave the mountain air, and 
how perfectly happy are they as they tuck their 
heads under their wings when the shadows of 
night fall and the wind cradles them on some 
swinging bough? 

The flocks and herds upon a thousand hills, the 
myriad forms of insect life, every winged fly and 
tuneful beetle, the fish that gaily sport and gambol 
in the rivers and seas, all can find the end of their 
being ; not a thought of future want disturbs their 
perfect tranquility. But never so with man. He 
only is never satisfied no matter what his wealth, 

31 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

or fame, or knowledge, or power, or earthly- 
pleasures. From the king to the beggar, "man 
never is, but always to be blest.' ' 

What is the explanation! Has God made the 
beast that perishes, to find its every desire grati- 
fied, while man is created with immortal longings 
that shall have no satisfactory response either in 
time or in eternity 1 

"We shall be satisfied when His glory shall 
appear." It is to this purpose God has given us 
this insatiable thirst. Man pants after happiness, 
infinite in duration ; his natural hopes and desires 
run beyond the bounds of time, his "soul uneasy 
and confined from home rests and expatiates in a 
life to come. ' ' 

Attempt, how monstrous and how surely vain! 

With things of earthly sort, with aught but God, 

With aught but moral excellence, truth and love 

To satisfy and fill the immortal soul. 

Attempt, vain inconceivable, attempt 

To satisfy the ocean with a drop, 

To marry immortality to death, 

And with the unsubstantial shade of time, 

To fill the embrace of all eternity. 

The Soul Immaterial, Therefore Immortal 

There is a close intimacy between mind and 
matter, but there is no identity between soul and 
body. We are accustomed to say that the eye 
sees, the ear hears, and the fingers feel, but they 
do not. The eyes and ears are but the instru- 

32 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

ments which become the media of intelligence to 
absolute mind, which nses them whenever that 
mind is inclined or obliged to employ them. So 
of the tongne and the hand, they are all adapted 
to perform the will of an indwelling and control- 
ing rational Spirit. 

To explain mind, it has been suggested that 
Galvanism or electricity is the source of the nerv- 
ous influence of the human system. Would all 
the Galvanism or electricity in the world produce 
the philosophy of Newton, which sought with all 
comprehending grasp to encircle the Universe of 
God? 

If mere Galvanic influence is the source of 
thought, then it would follow that if you could 
impart to a fool a greater quantity of electricity, 
you might bring him to the height of a Shakes- 
peare. The very statement of the thing is enough 
to demonstrate its absurdity. There must be some 
agent prior to and extraneous to the brain, which 
acts upon the brain, and thereby upon the physical 
system of man. 

Physiologists tell us that our bodies undergo 
complete changes. They say that every seven 
years every particle of man's physical structure 
is changed, or transferred or removed. If that 
be so. then the man of forty-nine has actually had 

33 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

seven bodies. Then if the mind is material, if it 
is of the body, it mnst have undergone a corre- 
sponding change, and, therefore, in every seven 
years a man's consciousness that he is mnst have 
changed, there would not be any recollection of his 
past life, nor knowledge of personal identity, nor 
assurance that at forty-nine years of age he is the 
same person that he was at twenty-one or 
thirty-five. 

You know that you have undergone changes, yet 
you have the consciousness of personal identity. 
What is that something that has remained intact, 
that has not been affected by the perpetual pulling 
down of the old material, and a perpetual replace- 
ment by new? In this human microcosm every 
time the watch ticks there are millions of mole- 
cules of the old body dissolved and carried away 
and their places supplied by as many millions of 
new. Yet you know, notwithstanding this process 
of destruction going on in every portion of your 
frame, that throughout the years you have main- 
tained your personal identity, which forces you 
to admit the presence of something beside matter, 
something that is free from the perpetual changes 
to which matter is subject — that matter flows on, 
while the spiritual substance called soul, endures 
distinct from and independent of matter. 

34 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

The soul is endowed with immortality as a part 
of its very nature. It is an immaterial substance, 
inaccessible to all violence from matter and, there- 
fore, cannot perish through its instrumentality. 
As Addison sings : 

The soul secure in her existence, smiles 
At the drawn dagger and defies its point. 
The stars may fade away, the sun himself 
Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years, 
But she shall flourish in immortal youth, 
Unhurt amidst the war of elements, 
The wreck of matter and the crash of worlds. 

The mind never sleeps. Who is not conscious 
that his mind is frequently in a state of more 
active and vigorous exercise during sleep than in 
the waking hours 1 

The famous astronomer, Sir John Herschell, 
declared that the following stanza was composed 
by him while sleeping and dreaming, November 28, 
1841, and written down immediately on waking : 

Throw thyself on thy God, nor mock him with feeble denial. 

Sure of his love and oh! sure of his mercy at last; 
Bitter and deep though its draught, yet shun not the cup of 
thy trial, 

But in its healing effect, smile at its bitterness past. 

Upon the hypothesis that the mind and the body 
are alike material, how are these things to be 
accounted for 1 Our very dreams by night instruct 
us that we have within these changing bodies of 
ours, a living, active principle, a spirit which dis- 

35 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

dains obedience to physical laws — refuses to rest 
when the body rests, and to die when the body 
dies, and which mnst, therefore, live on when the 
body shall crumble back to dust. 

If the mind grows and dies with the body, why 
is it that children have thoughts and fears and 
feelings which they are not able to express by the 
bodily organs? Children grow up with mental 
impressions that we cannot account for — the 
listening look, the riveted attention show that the 
mind in the child is greater than the body. 

"We find also that mind is not always wasted by 
disease. Take the case of George Dana Board- 
man, for many years minister of the First Baptist 
Church in Philadelphia. Paralysis had unnerved 
and unstrung his whole body. He was in the most 
distressed condition imaginable, yet his intellec- 
tual powers remained to his last moments un- 
scathed. The subtlety, the wisdom, the skill, the 
talent and the penetration of his mind remained 
as vigorous as in the meridian of his life — while 
he held death at bay he finished his ' ' Ethics of the 
Body," the crowning victory of his splendid 
genius. 

There must be something within man that con- 
stitutes real self, and which enables him to feel 
that in spite of all his physical calamities there is 

36 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

that in him which is superior to decay, and when 
the physical proportions of his being have dis- 
solved into the primitive elements of dust, his soul 
unaffected " stands immortal amid ruin'' like the 
soul of Ianthe described by Shelley: 

Sudden arose 

Ianthe's soul; it stood 

All beautiful in naked purity — 

The perfect semblance of its bodily frame 

Twined with inexpressible beauty and grace, 

Each stain of earthliness 

Had passed away; it re-assumed 

Its native dignity and stood 

Immortal amid ruin. 

The Future Life a Necessity to Vindicate 
God's Character 

All the arguments that go to prove the existence 
of God — a God endowed with such attributes as 
are essential to our very conception of His char- 
acter, point out the moral necessity of a future 
state of existence beyond the grave, in which the 
imperfections and inequalities of the present 
moral government will not only be redressed, but 
the whole will be shown to be holy and righteous. 

There is sin and there is punishment for sin, 
which we daily witness. But there is not for all 
sins such a reckoning in this world as meets the 
claims of righteousness and justice. Do we not 
see evil doings go undetected, and many bad men 
pass unpunished? 

37 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

"When we take a deliberate view we are naturally 
led to exclaim: ' ' "Wherefore do the wicked live, 
become old, yea, are mighty in power? Is there 
no punishment for the workers of iniquity? Is 
there no God that judge th in the earth?" And 
indeed, were there no retribution beyond the limits 
of this present life, we should be necessarily 
obliged to admit one or the other of the following 
conclusions : Either that no Moral Governor of 
the world exists or that "justice and judgment" 
are not "the habitations of His throne." 

If the moral government of God, the existence 
of which our experience avouches, is ever to have 
its administrations perfected and wrought to a 
complete actualizing of its own manifest prin- 
ciples, it can only be in another state of existence, 
and the double conclusion presses upon us, that 
there is a future life, and that that life is one of 
rewards and punishments. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox sees in this argument the 
necessity for a future life : 

The pain we have to suffer seems so broad 
Set side by side with this life's narrow span, 

We need no greater evidence that God 
Has some diviner destiny for man. 

He would not deem it worth his while to send 
Such crushing sorrows as pursue us here, 

Unless beyond this fleeting journey's end 
Our chastened spirits found another sphere, 

38 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

So small this world, so vast its agonies, 

A future life is needed to adjust 
These ill-proportioned wide discrepancies 

Between the spirit and its frame of dust. 

So when my soul writhes with some aching grief, 
And all my heart-strings tremble at the strain. 

My reason lends new courage to belief, 
And all God's hidden purposes seem plain. 



The Indestructibility of Matter 

According to the positive teaching of the most 
advanced science of the day nothing in the whole 
realm of nature is really destroyed in the sense 
of being annihilated. We have no power over 
matter to destroy it. We can only change its 
form. The mere mote floating in the sunbeam is 
imperishable. 

What we caH " death' ' does not involve extinc- 
tion, only change. When we speak of anything as 
destroyed, what we really mean is that it has 
altered its condition. When we affirm that it no 
longer is, we affirm only that it no longer is what 
it was. It has become something else. 

You may freeze a drop of water, or heat it to 
steam, decompose it into its elementary gases, or 
explode it ; it still exists, every atom of it ; or dis- 
pense or change its elements as we may, they will 
forever defy all efforts at their annihilation. 
Annihilation is a name for what never yet oc- 
curred to matter and never can. It is an estab- 

39 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

lished law of nature that nothing that is once 
launched into being shall ever go out of existence. 

We are told that the race is perpetual, but the 
individuals are perishable. To the animal the 
present is everything, while the future is the great 
fountain of man's happiness. If the present is all 
to the animal, when extinguished it loses nothing. 
But if man be annihilated he loses all the past 
treasures he has accumulated and foregoes all he 
anticipated for the future, a catastrophe too big 
for human imagination to conceive, too horrid for 
the mind to dwell upon. 

The destruction of the apple-tree is merely a 
change of form and development, a transmigra- 
tion of substance. The destruction of the tree is 
only its preparation for another existence, per- 
haps more beautiful than its former one; the 
destruction of my soul must, by necessity of the 
case, be utter annihilation. It can never be trans- 
migration, or be transferred to any other. The 
consciousness of personal identity which consti- 
tutes me is inalienable from me ; it must be extin- 
guished altogether or perpetuated in myself. 

The endless expansion and growth of the tree 
would be mischievous; there would be no space 
nor room for other trees just as useful. But the 
reverse is true of man's soul. The more he 

40 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

masters, the more he expands the powers of those 
around him 

Immortality's Influence on Conduct 

Eenan says one evidence for the truth of immor- 
tality may be found in the nobility of behavior it 
inspires. The idea that is but — 

The pilgrim of a day, 

Spouse of the worm and brother of the clay, 
Frail as the leaf in autumn's yellow bower, 
Dust in the wind or dew upon the flower, 

A child without a sire, 
"Whose mortal life and transitory fire, 
Light to the grave his chance created form, 
As ocean wrecks illuminate the storm. 

And then — 

To-night and silence sink forever more, 

does not kindle great deeds and strengthen for 
any sublime endeavor. Cicero said of the Epicu- 
rean creed that it was utterly to be rejected 
because it led to nothing worthy or generous. 

If death ends all, what an imposture is our 
system of laws on which society is founded. If 
we must wholly perish, the maxims of charity and 
justice and the precepts of honor and friendship 
are empty words. Why should they be binding if 
in this life only we have hope ? "What duty do we 
owe to the dead, to the living or to ourselves, if 
all will be nothing? 

41 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

If retribution terminates with the grave, moral- 
ity is a bugbear of human invention. What are 
the sweet ties of kindred if we shall not live again? 
What sanctity is there to the last wish of the 
dying if death is a wall instead of a door ? What 
is obedience to laws but an insane servitude? 
What is justice but an unwarrantable infringe- 
ment upon liberty? What are the laws of mar- 
riage but a vain scruple, and what is government 
but an imposition on credulity, if death ends all? 

There was one nation and only one that ever 
tried to destroy belief in God and immortality. 
France decreed in national convention that there 
was no God, and death was an eternal sleep. The 
Sabbath was abolished; churches were turned into 
temples of reason. The Bible was dragged along 
the streets in the spirit of derison and contempt. 

Infidelity then reigned and frightful was its 
reign. Its crown was terror, its throne the guil- 
lotine, its sceptre the battle-axe, its palace yard a 
field of blood, and its royal robes dripped with 
human gore. Gutters were filled with the torn 
shreds of human flesh. Property was confiscated. 
The morning breeze and evening wind bore across 
the vine-clad hills of France the cries of suffering 
and the shrieks of terror, and to save the metro- 
polis and the kingdom from utter desolation, the 

42 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

infidel authorities had to reinstate the Sabbath 
and public worship. 

Were the belief in God and immortality to die 
out in the human heart, the flood-gates of vice 
would open wide, plunge the world into the grave 
of despair, and consign humanity to the dungeons 
of the damned. 

Man's Unrealized Ideals 

A future life is needed for the working out of 
that moral completeness which the present never 
brings. We are cut off when we begin to be ready 
to do something in the world. 

Henry Ward Beecher said: "We are like 
plants in an inhospitable climate, which bear 
leaves and blossoms, but no fruit. Nature cannot 
do her work in vain. There must be some clime 
where we can bear our fruit. ' ' 

Victor Hugo expresses the hope that death is 
not life's close, but rather its beginning: "I feel 
in myself the future life; I am like a forest that 
has been more than once cut down ; the new shoots 
are stronger and livelier than ever ; I am rising I 
know towards the sky; the sunshine is upon my 
head; the earth gives me its generous sap, but 
heaven lights me with reflections of unknown 
worlds, You say the soul is nothing but the 

43 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

resultant of bodily powers, why, then, is my soul 
the most luminous when my bodily powers begin 
to fail? Winter is upon my head, and eternal 
spring is in my heart. I breathe at this hour the 
fragrance of the lilacs, the violets and the roses as 
at twenty years ; the nearer I approach the end, the 
plainer I hear around me the immortal sym- 
phonies of the worlds which invite me ; it is mar- 
velous, yet simple. For half a century I have been 
writing my thoughts in prose, verse, history, phil- 
osophy, drama, romance, tradition, satire, ode, 
song, I have tried all, but I feel that I have not 
said the thousandth part of what is in me. When 
I go down to the grave I can say, 'I have finished 
my life! My day's work will begin again the 
next morning. The tomb is not a blind alley — it 
is a thoroughfare ; it closes in the twilight to open 
with the dawn. My work is only beginning; my 
monument is hardly above its foundation; I would 
be glad to see it mounting forever ; the thirst for 
the infinite proves infinity \" 

Goethe says his belief in the immortality of the 
soul springs from the idea of activity, — "for I 
have the most assured conviction that our soul is 
of an essence absolute, indestructible, an essence 
that works on from eternity to eternity. It is 
like the sun, which, to our earthly eye, sinks and 

44 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

sets, but in reality never sinks but shines on 
unceasingly. ' ' 

Cicero, when his daughter, Tullia, the idol of 
his heart, died, retired from public life, buried 
himself in his books, and then wrote his famous 
sentence: "Man's grand ideals are overtures of 
immortality, because they require and demand 
immortality for their realization. ' ' 

Browning says : 

I know this earth is not my sphere, 
For I cannot so narrow me, but that 
I shall exceed it. 

This high ideal which is not reached on earth 
intimates an immortal life, which may afford time 
and scope for its realization. Lowell nobly says 
in his elegy on the death of Channing : 

Thou art not dead; in thy higher sphere 
Thy spirit bends itself to loving tasks, 

And strength to perfect what is dreamed of here 
Is all the crown and glory that it asks. 

Theodore Parker on his death-bed said to a 
friend, — ' ' I am not afraid to die, but I might wish 
to carry on my work. I have only half used the 
powers God gave me." 

Emmanuel Kant argued from the existence of a 
moral law unrealized and unrealizable here, the 
necessity of some after-life. "Perfection is the 
heritage with which God has endowed me, and 

45 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

since this short life does not give completeness, I 
must have the immortal life in which to find it. ' ' 

This yearning after perfection and complete- 
ness is the soul's qualification for and prophecy 
of its own immortality. I know no view-point 
from which the grandeur of life is more impres- 
sive. The high aspirations of the soul are no 
longer blasting mockeries. The problem of life 
is solved. 

The vast strides man has made during the short 
compass of his present earth-life in his march 
towards civilization, is a prophecy of the infinite 
possibilities before him in the future, and death 
is only a stage in man's evolution upward, only 
another name for birth, introducing him into 
another grander sphere of the eternal process 
moving on. 

Your past life has been downhill and towards 
gloom ; your future is uphill towards the glorious 
sunrise. 

Dying is throwing open the door that the bird 
may fly out of his netted cage and be heard sing- 
ing in higher flights and in diviner realms. 

The Immortality of Love 

The love that lightens life acts instinctively on 
the hypothesis of eternity. In the untimely death 

46 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

of Arthur Henry Hallam, Tennyson lost his dear- 
est friend. In his ' ' In Memoriam ' ' the poet 's love 
seeks an immortal support; in the persistence of 
love and longing to meet the loved again, the poet 
argues that death is only a temporary loss : 

But in my spirit will I dwell, 
And dream my dreams and hold it true, 
For though my lips may breathe adieu, 
I cannot think the thing, farewell. 

At the foot of the white marble cross which his 
wife placed upon the grave of Charles Kingsley, 
are graven these words: "We have loved, we 
love, we shall love. ' ' 

In the beautiful drama of Ion the instinct of 
immortality so eloquently uttered by the death of 
the devoted Greek finds a deep response in every 
soul. When about to yield his young existence a 
sacrifice to his fate, his beloved Clemanthe asks, if 
they shall meet again, to which he replies: "I 
asked that dreadful question of the hills that 
seemed eternal, of the clear streams that flow for- 
ever, of the stars among whose fields of azure, my 
spirit has walked. As I look upon thy loving face 
I feel that there is something in thy love that 
cannot wholly perish. We shall meet again, 
Clemanthe !" 

Love is forever. The marriage contract, "until 
death do us part," really does not mean a contract 

47 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

for this life only. Love's language is forever and 
she speaks no other tongue. 

In one of George MacDonald's romances there 
is a young girl, carefully nurtured, but who had 
never been touched religiously. She was engaged 
to marry a man who was a professed unbeliever. 
But it comes to pass, that this girl is awakened 
spiritually, that she comes to know herself as a 
being crowned with the sapphire glow of immor- 
tality, and she questions George : ' ' Tell me how 
long you will love me?" And after a little dis- 
cussion of that sort, she lets the young man go, 
because says she, ' ' It may be only a whim, but it is 
my whim to be loved as an immortal woman. ' ' 

None of us wants to be loved any other way, and 
if it were that we should not meet and know one 
another in heaven, then when our dead are laid 
away in the grave, our love for them ought to die. 
But we do not cease to love the dead, neither do 
we love them less, but rather more than we love 
the living, with a love more unselfish and with less 
taint of earthliness about it. And if we, with all 
our restrictions upon us, can love so ardently, 
how much more can those, who with ever-broaden- 
ing faculties have entered into the fulness of life, 
love with a deeper passion and more enduring 
intensity? 

48 



DOES DEATH END ALL? 

The yearning for the eternal life of those we 
love involves the certainty that the great heart 
of God will ont-soar, in the eternal order which 
He has established, our highest desires. 

When our friends have crossed the river, we are 
somehow bound to them by the cords of a death- 
less love. We can somehow never realize that 
they are gone. The looks, the forms, the voices, 
the smiles of the dead are still with us. We feel 
their mysterious nearness. Love still teaches us 
to love them. In every tear that we shed, in every 
sigh that we heave, we have so many proofs in the 
soul itself, that the dead, whose memory we so 
fondly cherish, still live beyond the grave. 

We are richer for having loved, although we 
lost. As Tennyson puts it: 

This truth came borne with bier and pall, 

I felt it when I sorrowed most; 
Tis better to have loved and lost 

Than never to have loved at all. 

With Whittier we hopefully cry : 

Yet love will dream and faith will trust, 
Since He who knows our need is just, 
That somewhere, somehow meet we must. 
Alas! for him who never sees 
The stars shine through his cypress trees; 
Who hopeless lays his dead away 
Nor looks to see the breaking day 
Across the mournful marbles play, 
Who hath not learned in hours of faith — 
The truth to flesh and sense unknown, 
That Life is ever lord of Death. 
And Love can never lose its own. 

49 



What Has the Old Testament to Say Upon 
the Life Beyond? 



Far o'er yon horizon 

Rise the city towers, 
Where our God abideth; 

That fair home is ours. 
Flash the streets with Jasper, 

Shine the gates with gold; 
Flows the gladdening river 

Shedding joys untold; 
Thither, onward thither, 

In the Spirit's might; 
Pilgrims to your country, 

Forward into Light! 

— Henry Alford. 



No moaning of the bar; sail forth, strong ship, 

Into that gloom which has God's face for a far light. 

Not a dirge, but a proud farewell from each fond lip — 
And praise, abounding praise, and fame's faint starlight. 

Lamping thy tuneful soul to that large noon 

Where thou shalt choir with angels. Words of woe 

Are for the unfulfilled, not thee, whose noon 
Of genius sinks full-orbed, glorious, aglow. 

No moaning of the bar; musical drifting 
Of Time's waves, turning to the eternal sea, 

Death's soft wind all thy gallant canvas lifting, 
And Christ thy Pilot to the peace to be. 

— Sir Edwin Arnold, on the Death of Tennyson. 

Still seems it strange that thou shouldst live forever? 

Is it less strange that thou shouldst live at all? 

This is a miracle, and that no more, 

Who gave beginning can exclude an end, 

Deny thou art — then doubt if thou shalt be, 

A miracle with miracles enclosed 

Is man; and starts his faith at what is strange? 

What less than wonders from the Wonderful? 

What less than miracles from God can flow? 

Admit a God (that mystery supreme! 

That cause uncaused) , all other wonders cease. 

Nothing is marvelous for him to do! 

Deny Him . . . All is mystery besides! 

Millions of mysteries! each darker far 

Than that they wisdom would unwisely shun, 

If weak thy faith, why choose the harder side? 

We know nothing but what is marvelous; 

Yet what is marvelous we can't believe. — Young. 



CHAPTER II 

What Has the Old Testament to Say Upon 
the Life Beyond? 

Revelation confirms the teachings of nature, 
corroborates the wisdom of the philosophers and 
supplements the songs of the poets. Coleridge 
said : ' l The Bible finds me as nothing else does. ' ' 

We do not turn to Plato for comfort in sorrow. 
The conscience convinced of sin finds no forgive- 
ness in Goethe. Shakespeare cannot lift us above 
life's disappointments. Homer cannot impart 
strength in temptation's hour. And in our gro- 
ping for immortality, all logic, philosophy and 
poetry combined cannot give us the unmistakable 
assurance of a hereafter. The Bible only can 
inspire that blessed hope. 

When Sir Walter Scott was dying, he said: 
"Read to me." "From what book?" was asked. 
He answered, "Need you ask? There is but one 
book for a dying man, and that is the Bible. ' ' 

"This precious Book I'd rather have 
Than all the golden gems 
That e'er in monarch's coffers shone, 
Or on their diadems. 

55 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

And were the sea one chrysolite, 

This earth a golden ball 
And gems were all the stars of night, 

This Book were worth them all." 

The great hereafter is an ever-present underly- 
ing fact which runs like a golden thread from 
Genesis to Revelation. Like the existence of God 
the Bible takes for granted onr immortality, assur- 
ing those who are in fellowship with God of a 
blessed life beyond the horizon of death. 

It is popularly supposed that the glorified union 
of the soul and the body in the future life is pre- 
eminently a doctrine of the New Testament, and 
that in this sense Jesus Christ alone "hath brought 
life and immortality to light." Indeed many 
writers strangely pretend to doubt whether the 
Jews knew anything at all of another life. 

The Bible starts out with the conception that 
man sustains relations to God which are never to 
cease. The creation of man is not explained 
scientifically, how matter or man were created, 
there are no theories indulged as to man's origin, 
except that God created him in His own image. 
' ' So God created man in His own image, ' ' (Genesis 
1: 26.) The material likeness of God was not 
here referred to. God has no corporeal image. 
"And the Lord God spake unto you out of the 
midst of the fire, ye heard the voice of the words, 

56 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

but saw no similitude, only ye heard the voice.' ' 
(Deut. 4:12.) 

To the Hebrews "in the image of God" meant 
that they were created with a soul invisible and 
undying as the divine Spirit. Thus we are told 
(Genesis 2: 7), "and the Lord God formed man 
out of the dust of the ground, and breathed into 
his nostrils the breath of life ; and man became a 
living soul." Here emphatic expression is given 
to man's two-fold nature. 

Certain Hebrew scholars maintain that this doc- 
trine of a dual life is disclosed even in the fact 
that the Hebrew synonym for life has a plural 
form. Benson translates the phrase "the breath 
of life," "the soul of lives," and the author of the 
Literal Translations from the Hebreiv, renders 
the passage, "and Jehovah Elohim formed a very 
man of the dust of the ground, and blew into his 
nostrils the living spirit and man was for a living 
creature." Thus on the very first page of the 
Pentateuch the immortality of the soul was a prin- 
ciple well-known and fully understood. 

The Old Testament again and again draws a dis- 
tinction between spirit and flesh. ' ' And they fell 
on their faces and said, ! God, the God of the 
spirits of all flesh." Numbers 16: 22. "Behold, 
He put no trust in His servants ; and His angels 

57 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

He charged with folly ; how much less in them that 
dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the 
dust, which are crushed before the moth?" Job. 
4: 18, 19. Here the soul is clearly distinguished 
from the body as the occupant of the house is dis- 
tinguished from the house. "But his flesh upon 
him shall have pain. His soul within shall mourn. ' ' 
Job. 14: 22. " Flesh' ' and "soul" are placed in 
contradistinction — the flesh is "upon him," the 
soul is "within him." "But there is a spirit in 
man, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth 
him understanding." Job. 32: 8. "The Lord 
forme th the spirit of man within him." Zech. 12. 

The original decree of death, Genesis 3 : 19, im- 
plies only the death of the body — "for dust thou 
art, and unto dust shalt thou return." And 
Ecclesiastes 12: 7, "Then shall the dust return to 
the earth as it was ; and the spirit shall return unto 
God who gave it," is only an explanation of the 
scope and design of the decree that the "dust" or 
body only is to "return to the earth as it was," 
while the spirit, "the breath of lives," blown into 
Adam by his Creator, was not dust, nor "taken 
out of the ground, ' ' but is to " return unto God who 
gave it." The spirit, therefore, has no affinity 
for the material clod, and was not doomed to the 
dust with the body at death. 

58 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

" Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for 
God took him. ' ' Genesis 5 : 24. The Israelites mnst 
have understood that Enoch was taken away to 
enjoy a better existence than the earthly life. 
God took him to Himself to heaven; to be with 
Him on high with whom he walked below. The 
sacred writer explains (Hebrews 6:5): "He was 
translated that he should not see death. ' ' 

How could Noah have been "a preacher of 
righteousness ' ' without having some motive to 
present from another world, or without exhibiting 
the end of righteousness, which is "quietness and 
assurance forever ? ' ' The writer of the Epistle to 
the Hebrews tells us that what Noah and the 
patriarchs did they did "by faith." Faith itself 
implies the knowledge of a future life, for it is 
"the substance of things hoped for, the evidence 
of things not seen." The same writer says that 
Abraham and a host of others looked for a heav- 
enly country. (Hebrews 11.) 

Christ himself declared that Moses knew that 
the dead are raised. Luke 20 : 37, 38 : "Now that 
the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush 
when he called the Lord the God of Abraham, and 
the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For He 
is not the God of the dead, but of the living : for all 
live unto him." 

59 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

The strong desire which reigned in the hearts 
of the Old Testament saints to be bnried together 
with their kindred in the same place is also proof 
that they believed in a perpetual union with their 
friends through death in a future life. They had 
lived together in life ; they wished to lie together 
in death; to rise together in resurrection and to 
dwell together in everlasting habitations. 

The familiar phrase " gathered to his people" or 
"gathered to his fathers," does not mean simply 
to die or to be buried in a family tomb, but it 
meant joining them in the other world. This is 
the clear decision of the best commentators of the 
various schools. Says Gerlach on Genesis 15 : 15, 
"Thou shalt go to thy fathers, or thy people, in 
peace, is the gracious expression for a life after 
death. ' ' Says Baumgarten, ' ' A continuance after 
death is assuredly expressed therein." Knobel 
remarks on Genesis 25: 8, "Abraham was gath- 
ered to his fathers, was associated with his ances- 
tors in sheol." Sheol, like the Greek Hades, is a 
general term, meaning simply eternity, or the 
regions of the dead, without designating the par- 
ticular condition of the dead as happy or miser- 
able. Their actual condition must be determined 
by the context. 

The phrase "to go to his fathers," "to be 

60 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

gathered to his fathers, ' ' and the very common one 
to " sleep with his fathers' ' all have the same 
meaning. Delitzsch takes the same gronnd on 
Genesis 25: 8: "That Abraham was buried is 
first stated further on ; the nnion with his relatives 
who had gone before thns takes place first, not at 
his interment, bnt already in the moment of death. 
The nnion with the fathers is not mere union of 
corpses, bnt of persons.' ' 

This view is strongly reinforced by the repeated 
designation of the whole present life, however 
protracted, as a pilgrimage. "The days of the 
years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty 
years ; few and evil have the days of the years of 
my life been and have not attained unto the days 
of the years of the life of my fathers in the days 
of their pilgrimage. ' ' (Genesis 47: 9.) "I am a 
stranger with thee, and a sojourner, as all my 
fathers were." (Psalm 39: 12.) The writer of 
the Epistle to the Hebrews certainly puts this con- 
struction on these utterances, for he says that the 
patriarchs "confessed that they were strangers 
and pilgrims on the earth ; for they that say such 
things declare plainly that they seek a country, — a 
better country; that is, an heavenly." (Heb. 11: 
13, 14, 16.) 

The Hebrew regarded life as a journey, as a pil- 
61 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

grimage on the face of the earth. The traveler, 
as they supposed, when he arrived at the end of 
his journey, which happened when he died, was 
received into the company of his ancestors, who 
had gone before him. 

Opinions of this kind (viz., that life is a journey, 
that death is the end of that journey, and that, 
when one dies he mingles with the hosts who have 
gone before) are the origin and ground of such 
phrases as the following: to be gathered to one's 
people: to go to one's fathers. 

This visiting of the fathers has reference to the 
immortal part, and is clearly distinguished from 
the mere burial of the body. The closing scenes 
of the life of Moses, his journey up the peaks of 
Pisgah and Nebo to die, together with his message 
that he left with the people assuring them that God 
would meet him, must all have made very real to 
the people the truth that there was a life beyond 
the grave. 

The body of Moses slept in the valley of the 
land of Moab, but his spirit, not sleeping or uncon- 
sciously waiting in the grave for the sound of the 
last trumpet, had been fourteen hundred years in 
heaven, and in recognizable form talked with 
Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration. 

A decisive indication amounting to a positive 
62 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

proof of a belief in the continued existence of the 
departed is the practice of magical invocations of 
the dead, a practice which Moses was obliged to 
prohibit by law. In Dent. 18: 10, 11, he com- 
mands, ' ' There shall not be f onnd among yon any 
one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass 
through the fire, or that useth divination, or an 
observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or 
a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or 
a wizard, or a necromancer. ' ' 

The clear comment on this law, and conclusive 
proof of the strong hold of the belief and practice 
upon the nation, is found in the interview of Saul 
with the Witch of Endor (I. Samuel 28: 7-20). 
Saul went with the demand, " Bring me him up 
whom I shall name unto thee." The woman's 
reply shows that this was a common pretension of 
the whole class of wizards: " Behold, thou 
knowest what Saul hath done, how he hath cut oft 
those who have familiar spirits, and wizards out of 
the land; wherefore then layest thou a snare for 
my life to cause me to die V 9 When Saul had reas- 
sured her, she inquires in a most sweeping way, 
"Whom shall I bring up unto thee?" He calls 
for Samuel. The sequel need not be related. 
There is no disguising the fact that there were 
persons in Israel who pretended to summon the 

63 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

dead into communication with the living, and the 
belief in their power was so extended as to require 
a special exertion of the king's authority to banish 
them from the kingdom, and the belief in spiritual- 
ism was so deep-seated that even the king himself 
was a victim of the delusion. But the prevalent 
belief in the ability to bring up the dead must have 
rested on an equally prevalent belief that the dead 
were still in being.* 

Balaam, the heathen prophet, saw the light of 
immortality when he prayed, "Let me die the 
death of the righteous, and let my last end be like 
his. ,, (Numbers 33: 10.) 

*If the future life is to be judged by the disclosures made 
of it by the representatives of modern spiritualism, we are 
forced to conclude that the inhabitants of that future life are 
souls in the process of losing their mental powers — souls des- 
tined soon to become extinct; and under such circumstances 
eternity is not attractive enough to convince a man that it is 
worth striving for. 

The Bible teaches that men may deal with spirits and be 
entirely under their control, but it also tells us the character 
of the spirits, "lying wonders," "seducing spirits and doc- 
trines of devils which will shipwreck our faith," "wicked," 
"unclean," "familiar spirits," "possessed with devils," and 
this is how God speaks of this delusion: "I will be a swift 
witness against the sorcerer." "There shall not be among 
you a consulter of familiar spirits, or wizard, or necromancer, 
for they that do these things are an abomination unto the 
Lord." 

The Bible speaks of angels appearing unto men. But angels 
are not the spirits of dead men. They are an entirely dif- 
ferent order of beings. When angels appeared unto men no 
medium was used, no admission charged, no circles formed, 
no turning down of lights, no cabinets, no planchettes. The 
angels came directly to the persons to whom they were sent, 
and never in a darkened room. 

64 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

Again, take the ascent of Elijah in a chariot of 
fire (II. Kings 2 : 1-11). Can we believe that Israel 
had no conception of its meaning? It needed 
figuration to intimate that, thongh absent from 
earth, he was present with God. 

It is clear that the sentence "the soul that sin- 
neth, it shall die" and the promise that he who 
"repented and turned to righteousness shall live," 
must have involved a future beyond the limits of 
man's earthly existence. 

Of all the passages of the Old Testament that 
bear upon the problems of eschatology, few com- 
pare in their pregnant significance with EzekiePs 
declaration that ' ' the Lord hath no pleasure in the 
death of him that dieth," but was evermore seek- 
ing to bring him back to life. 

David with no uncertain voice expresses his 
belief that he would one day be re-united with his 
beloved child, "And he said, while the child was 
yet alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, who can 
tell whether God will be gracious unto me, and the 
child may live! But now he is dead, wherefore 
should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I 
shall go to him, but he shall not return unto me. ' ' 
(Samuel 12: 22, 23.) 

David's deep convictions of immortality breathe 
in his Psalms. Psalm 16: 10, "For thou wilt not 

65 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
leave my soul in hell (the grave), neither wilt thou 
suffer thy holy one to see corruption." Psalm 
17: 14, 15, "As for me I will behold thy face in 
righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I shall 
awake with thy likeness." Psalm 49: 15, "But 
God shall redeem my soul from the power of the 
grave : for he shall receive me. ' ' Psalm 73 : 24-26, 
1 l Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and after- 
wards receive me into glory. Whom have I in 
heaven but thee ? and there is none on earth that I 
desire beside thee. My heart and my flesh f aileth ; 
but God is the strength of my heart, and my 
portion forever.' ' Psalm 139 : 7, 12, 23-24. 

The sacrifices of the temple, the solemn ritual of 
the day of atonement, the sense of guilt which 
uttered itself in confessions like the 51st Psalm, 
the anticipation of deliverance from it — all im- 
plied the thought that the mischief wrought by sin 
did not terminate with death, and that there was a 
restoration from it possible even after death. 
David could look forward to the journey through 
the valley of death without fear, for the divine 
guide would be with him even there. Psalm 23 : 4. 

David seems sometimes to have taken a dark 
view of death. For instance, Psalm 6: 5, "For in 
death there is no remembrance : in the grave who 
shall give thee thanks?" or again, Psalm 30: 9, 

66 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

" What profit is there in my blood, when I go down 
to the pit? Shall the dust praise thee? Shall it 
declare thy truth ?" These texts read only by 
themselves apparently justify the assertion that 
the belief of individual Israelites concerning the 
future state was doubtful. But examine these 
verses in their context and you will find them quite 
consistent with a belief in a life beyond the grave. 
Rabbi Herrman Alder says : 

"The Psalms from which the extracts in ques- 
tion are taken were composed at a season of 
extreme depression, when the writer was sick unto 
death, when David felt himself estranged from 
God in consequence of his great sin. What pros- 
pect does this after-state offer unto him who has 
forfeited heaven's favor? He is aware that the 
earthly life is the season for serving God, and that 
only by sincere and active repentance can he 
obtain forgiveness of his trespass. If opportunity 
be not given him for working out his soul's salva- 
tion, he has grievous cause to dread divine punish- 
ment. 

1 ' The revealed word of God does not describe the 
nature of this penalty. It only hints at it by the 
terrible phrase of ' cutting off the souP. From 
this annihilation he prays to be delivered, 
* Return, Lord, deliver my soul: save me for 

67 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

thy mercy's sake ! For in death there is no remem- 
brance of thee: in the grave who shall give thee 
thanks V (Psalm 6: 4, 5.) He laments in the 
bitterness of his grief, that if he be cnt off in his 
sin, he will be unable to serve his God. But how 
can it be maintained that David had no firm belief 
in immortality? David, who, when he is at peace 
with God, declares with unshaken confidence, 'As 
for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness ; I 
shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness \ 
1 ' The sublime truth sung by the sweet singer of 
Israel is echoed with no less fervor and vigor by 
the other Psalmists. The forty-ninth Psalm pre- 
sents the doubts as to divine justice which crowd 
upon the minds of those who are troubled by the 
apparent glory of the careless and insolent, and 
the sorrows of the poor and virtuous. The Psalm- 
ist announces the answer to our questioning and 
disquietude. The morning comes which follows 
the night of death, and with it comes the awaken- 
ing; the beauty and grandeur of the wicked and 
haughty fall into utter dissolution: 'But God 
will redeem my soul from the power of the nether 
world, for he shall receive me'. (Verse 15). He 
does not expect that his body will be delivered 
from the universal doom of man, but, fired by real 
living faith in a living God, he feels assured that 

68 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

there is a future state in which the just Ruler of 
the world will make full amends for the unequal 
distribution of burdens which He wisely permits 
in this life of probation. 

' ' This thought is dwelt upon with even greater 
emphasis by Asaph in the seventy-third Psalm, 
wherein the writer, seeking to solve the problem 
of the prosperity of the wicked and the adversity 
of the pious, finds the solution when he went into 
the sanctuary of God: 'Then understood I their 
end'. He is sustained by the hope, 'Thou shalt 
guide me with thy counsel and afterwards receive 
me into glory'. 'My heart, and my flesh faileth, 
but God is the strength of my heart, and my 
portion forever'. What stronger assertion could 
there be of personal immortality?" 

Isaiah, with the spirit of the Lord upon him 
announces, "He shall destroy death forever, and 
the Lord God shall wipe away tears from off all 
faces." (25: 8.) And again he addresses his 
sublime appeal to the house of Israel, ' ' Thy dead 
men shall live, thy dead bodies will arise. Awake 
and sing, ye that dwell in the dust : for thy dew is 
as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out 
the dead." (Isaiah 24: 19.) Behold Ezekiel 
preach his splendid vision, the revival of the dead 
bones (chapter 37), and who dare assert that the 

69 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

prophets were ignorant or careless of the doctrine 
of a future life! 

Job appeals from his narrow-minded judges on 
earth to God on high, beseeching him to hear and 
try his cause, and in the strength of his appeal his 
eye grows clear and undimmed. His sickness 
appears mortal, he has no hope in life, but his 
intense conviction that justice must and will 
be done to him possesses him more and more: 
1 ' For I know that my Eedeemer liveth, and that he 
shall stand at the latter day upon the earth ; and 
after my skin has been destroyed, yet out of my 
flesh shall I see God." (Job 19 : 25, 26.) This is 
the sum total of all that has been said and written 
concerning immortality — " After my dissolution I 
shall see God." 

The book of Ecclesiastes shows forth the weari- 
ness which overtakes the man whose chief good 
and market of his time is sensual gratification, 
whose mind gloomed by doubt, utters the despair- 
ing cry : ' ' For that which bef alleth them, as the 
one dies, so dieth the others." But the book like- 
wise shows us the process by which men are to 
fight out and conquer the doubts that spring up in 
their hearts. At the close the preacher gives 
utterance to the emphatic declaration, i i Then shall 
the dust return unto the earth as it was, and the, 

70 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

spirit shall return to God who gave it." (7:7.) 
In these words there is neither doubt nor waver- 
ing. The dualism of man's nature is fully 
acknowledged. Entire belief in the soul's immor- 
tality triumphs over all the gloom and weariness 
that had tinged his previous meditations, removing 
at once and forever the thought of death as 
annihilation. 

In the same chapter, verses thirteen and four- 
teen, we find a very distinct assertion of future 
retribution: "Let us hear the conclusion of the 
whole matter : Fear God and keep his command- 
ments ; for this is the whole duty of man. For God 
shall bring every work into judgment, with every 
secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be 
evil." That the judgment here spoken of is a 
future one, is very clear from verse seven of the 
same chapter, where the writer speaks of the 
appearance of the spirit, separated from the body, 
before God, to receive the compensation for its 
works. 

Still more distinct, if possible, is the utterance 
of Daniel 12 : 2, 3, "And many of them that sleep 
in the dust of the earth shall wake, some to ever- 
lasting life, and some to shame and everlasting 
contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as 
the brightness of the firmament; and they that 

71 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

turn many to righteousness, as the stars forever 
and ever. ' ' 

The Talmud and Immortality 

A special mansion will be given in heaven to 
every pious man. 

This world is like a road-side inn, but the world 
to come is like a real home. 

The longest life is insufficient for the fulfilment 
of half of man's desires. 

Better one hour's happiness in the next world 
than a whole life time of pleasure in this. 

One man may earn immortality by the work of a 
few short years, while others earn it by the work 
of a long life. 

He who lays up no store of good deeds during 
the working days of life can never enjoy the 
eternal Sabbath. 

This world is an antechamber to the next. 

Prepare thyself in the antechamber that thou 
mayest worthily enter the throne-room. 

The just of all nations have a portion in the 
future reward. 

For the righteous there is no rest, neither in 
this world nor in the next, for they go, say the 
Scriptures, "from strength unto strength, from 
task to task, until they shall see God in Zion." 

The grave is like a Melotian (silken) raiment 
72 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

for the pious man, who comes fully provided with 
provisions ; the pious man can look upon the future 
life without fear, because he comes to the other 
world well prepared. 

"Man is born to die, but the dead shall live 
again. ' ' " Better is the day of death than the day 
of birth." These sayings are illustrated as fol- 
lows: Two vessels sail on the ocean at one and 
the same time ; the one is leaving, the other enter- 
ing the harbor. For the one which arrived a num- 
ber of friends had prepared a great feast, and with 
clapping of hands and great vociferations of joy, 
they celebrated her arrival, while the other which 
was leaving received sighs and tears. An intelli- 
gent man, who was a spectator of what passed, 
said: "Here quite the reverse appears to take 
place, as otherwise ought to happen. They 
rejoice over the one which cometh, and feel sad- 
dened over the departure of the other. "What a 
fallacy! Eejoice over the one which has accom- 
plished its voyage and is returning from many 
dangers to safety, and bewail rather the vessel 
which is coming in, for she will have to brave again 
the storms of an inconstant sea." The same when 
man is born great rejoicing takes place, while at 
his death much grief is expressed. One ought to 
weep at his birth, because no one is certain whether 

73 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

he will be able to overcome the dangers and temp- 
tations of life ; whilst at his death one ought to feel 
pleased if he only leaves a good name behind him. 
At his birth man is entered into the book of death ; 
when he dies he is entered into the book of life. 

Christ and Immortality 

Thus we have seen that the knowledge of immor- 
tality is older than the Gospel. It was at least a 
vague and dreamy anticipation in all ages. Christ 
brought "life and immortality to light' ' — He 
lifted the old conception out of probability into the 
realm of assurance. He removed the subject from 
the sphere of speculation into that of a positive 
truth, founded on experience. He went down into 
the grave and came forth a glorious Conqueror 
and said: "I am He that liveth and was dead, 
and because I live ye shall live also." So surely 
as Christ rose, so did He guarantee as an absolute 
certainty the resurrection of our bodies into a 
glorious life. The life of the soul never pauses 
even for a moment. He has brought to pass the 
saying that is written, " Death is swallowed up in 
victory, Death! where is thy sting? Grave! 
where is thy victory V 9 

The Crucified One appeared to his disciples and 
showed them his hands and his side and so thor- 

74 



THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING 

ouglily convinced them that "He who lived and 
was dead was now alive f orevermore, ' ' that in the 
strength of this conviction, they rallied from 
despair and went forth to conquer the world to 
Christ. There is no other fact of ancient history 
which is sustained by such an array of evidence, 
external and internal, as the life, death and resur- 
rection of Jesus Christ. 

He died as all must die. He lives and so in 
him we have evidence that we shall live. He is 
not the first to live beyond death, as all the sons 
of Adam before him had risen above the shock of 
dissolution, but he was the first to gain full per- 
fection of life, and perfect knowledge of the here- 
after, and his resurrection is a pledge that all the 
children of God shall gain full perfection of life, 
and so the believer may say with the assurance 
of Paul : " We know that if this earthly house of 
our tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building 
of God, a house not made with hands eternal in 
the heavens. ,, 

Said one of those who ate and drank with him 
after he arose from the dead: " Blessed be the 
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which, 
according to his abundant mercy, hath begotten 
us again to a lively hope, by the Eesurrection of 
Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance 

75 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

incorruptible, undefiled, and that f adeth not away, 
reserved in heaven." 

Carlyle speaks of his beloved friend, John 
Sterling, dying at thirty-eight, as a brave man, 
"looking steadfastly into the silent continents of 
Death and Eternity.' ' And Sterling, a few days 
before his death, writing to Carlyle, shows how, to 
one who has fonnd the solution of his spiritual 
problem in Christ, it is possible even in the midst 
of one's best days, to lay down these beautiful 
affairs of earth and to feel a human interest in the 
life to come : "I tread the common road, ' ' he says, 
"into the great darkness, without any thought of 
fear, and with very much hope. It is all very 
strange, but not one hundredth part so sad as it 
seems to the standers-by." 



A Comforting Belief 



Did He not to his followers say, 
I am the Life, the Light, the Way? 

Yea, and still from the heavens he saith, 
The gate of life is the gate of death. 

— Phoebe Cary. 



Beyond life's toils and cares, 
Its hopes and joys, its weariness and sorrow, 
Its sleepless nights, its days of smiles and tears, 
Will be a long, sweet life unmarked by years, 

One bright unending morrow. 

Beyond time's troubled stream, 
Beyond the chilling waves of death's dark river, 
Beyond life's lowering clouds and fitful gleams, 
Its dark realities and brighter dreams, 

A beautiful forever. 

No aching hearts are there, 
No tear-dimmed eye, no form by sickness wasted, 
No cheek grown pale through plenary of care, 
No spirits crushed beneath the woes they bear, 

No sigh for bliss untasted. 

No sad farewell is heard, 
No lonely wail for loving ones departed, 
No dark remorse is there o'er memories stirred, 
No smile of scorn, no harsh or cruel word 

To grieve the broken-hearted. 

No long, dark night is there, 
No light from sun or silvery moon is given, 
But Christ, the Lamb of God all bright and fair, 
Illumes the city with effulgence rare, 

The glorious light of heaven. 

No mortal eye hath seen 
The glories of that land beyond the river, 
Its crystal lakes, its fields of living green, 
Its fadeless flowers and the unchanging sheen 

Around the throne forever. 

Ear hath not heard the songs 
Of rapturous praise within that shining portal, 
No heart of man hath dreamed what bliss belongs 
To that redeemed and joyous blood- washed throng, 

All glorious and immortal. 

— Mrs. J. E. Akers. 



CHAPTER III 
A Comforting Belief 

Were we to believe that death ends all, that the 
cessation of the mortal life terminated the career 
of being, that the sun of hope was never to arise 
above the eternal horizon of to-morrow, the pres- 
ent existence wonld be a nightmare of horror, even 
to those who fall heirs to the enjoyments of the 
world, for earth's pleasures are but pain, earth's 
riches but dross. 

Nothing satisfies here; everything cloys and 
palls upon the senses. The man of wealth and 
learning in this respect is no better off than 
his poorest neighbor. The latter is often envy- 
ing the wealthy, while the rich man is sigh- 
ing for an indefinable something to fill up the 
void in his life, but the void can never be 
filled by time; its capacity is the measure of 
eternity. 

The ever-constant longing in the heart of man 
is a proof that this world is not his home, that the 
tomb is not the objective point where the final line 
is drawn, beyond which none may go — 

81 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

. . . time is fleeting, 
But the grave is not its goal, 
"Dust thou art to dust returnest," 
Was not spoken of the soul. 

It is the soul within that whispers words of hope 
to our consciousness and gives us faith in the 
immortality of a future life, and this beautiful 
faith yields to the thoughtful mind a happiness 
which nothing else can confer, gives a satisfaction 
even to our present state of unrest, in fact, 
paradoxically speaking, brings contentment amid 
the discontentment of our being. 

Young in his "Night Thoughts " has well said: 

" 'Tis immortality, 'tis that alone 

Amid life's pains, abasement, emptiness, 

The soul can comfort, elevate and fill." 

We gladly seize upon all that tends to emphasize 
our belief in the hereafter, cheerfully grasp every 
fact confirmatory of our faith in the eternal. 

"We look within and contemplate the soul's 
nature, and from its power to think, to reason and 
love, we conclude that it is a spiritual substance 
that cannot be dissolved by death, that it will sur- 
vive the passage of time and live through the end- 
less progression of the infinite. 

Such conclusion brings us a spiritual comfort 
which enables us to bear willingly with the trials 
and sorrows and disappointments of the present 
transitory state, makes us strong to withstand the 

82 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

shocks and knocks and buffetings of this fleeting 
world, in the hope that it gives us a reward in the 
great future that now lies behind the veil of time. 

We realize that not here will be the fulfilment 
of our dream, nor the attainment of the soul's 
desire, nor the consummation of its ambitions, that 
not here shall we gather the fruition of the harvest, 
although we must scatter the seeds in the present. 
We look to the limitless fields of the vast beyond to 
reap the golden store and hoard it in the granaries 
of eternity. Our eyes are ever turned to the world 
unseen where life is love, and love is something 
infinitely better and higher than we can possibly 
conceive in our present finite and confined con- 
dition, circumscribed as we are in knowledge, and 
barred from the larger enlightenment by the dark- 
ness of the mortal flesh. 

The aspirations of the soul, the continual yearn- 
ings, the insuppressible desires within forcibly 
impress us that earth is not our abiding home, that 
the grave is not the final resting place, that life is 
not a mere bubble arising on the waves of time to 
float for a moment and then sink into the depths 
of nothingness, but that being is as boundless as 
the universe, that it shall go on for ever after sun 
and moon have paled their light, after the dust of 
worlds now revolving in their orbits shall have 

83 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

mingled itself with new systems to perform their 
course through the fields of space. Life shall ever 
go on, — we shall live and know and expand for- 
ever, endowed with a higher intelligence fitting to 
the everlasting existence. 

We have now only imagination to aid us in pic- 
turing what is to be when that which we call time is 
snuffed out and the eternal light dawns upon the 
soul. We can, however, be certain that all faith 
can grasp and hope can paint will be more than 
realized in the glory of the immortality. 

Truly the reward will be exceedingly great, such 
as no imagination, however fervid, can conceive. 
Its anticipation, its hope of realization makes us 
long for the moment when, free forever from this 
mortal coil, we can " enter into the joy of the 
Lord." 

What is earth with its pomps and splendors? 
Nothing but vanity. Its boasted treasures and 
pleasures cannot appease, cannot bring a moment 
of real happiness to kings or emperors. Even the 
mightiest here are pitiable in their weakness, but 
in the beyond all shall be strong; the poor, rich; 
the diseased, whole; the discontented, satisfied; 
the weary and heavy-laden, refreshed in the bosom 
of the Father. Sickness shall be turned to health, 
sorrow to joy, and failure to success. 

84 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

Now time is short and we can do bnt little. 
There time will have no end and we can accom- 
plish everything. The old rusty clock of finite 
years will have ticked away its last seconds, and 
we shall listen to the morning bells of eternity 
chiming the beginning of the everlasting hours, 
calling ns to a ceaseless existence of joy. 

All of ns have strong intimations of the endless 
progressiveness of moral development, of qualities 
that will never cease to enlarge and expand, ever 
becoming more worthy of Him who gave us being 
and desires us to be like unto himself. We have 
prescience of character so fulfilling itself and per- 
petually rounding out in line with the divine ideal 
as to approach to the perfection of the Infinite. 

In our superb moments, when the mind is at its 
best, we get suggestions of an intellectual enlarge- 
ment, an assimilation of knowledge, postponed by 
the present limitations of time, that will bring us 
to an understanding of heavenly perfections and 
enable us to grasp the attributes of the Supreme 
Power. Visions come to us of a service flung open 
like rifts in an encompassing cloud, where the 
spirit in unison with the designs of God shall be 
so adapted and inspired as to apprehend the divine 
will and conform in worship to all that is required 
by a divine intelligence and wisdom. 

85 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Indeed we can put no limit on the possibilities of 
the life following the so-called earthly death, on 
its scope, its freedom from limitations, on the 
opportunities that will be given for advancing 
higher and higher in the scale of perfection. 

The happiness derived from our faith in immor- 
tality will be in proportion to the strength and 
determination we call forth to lead such lives of 
virtue and uprightness and honor on earth as will 
merit divine acknowledgment in corresponding 
rewards hereafter. If we defy God's laws, break 
his commandments, trample on the rights of his 
children, we cannot expect that he will recom- 
pense us as he does those who obey him. 

We must have faith that virtue will receive its 
due merit, and to enjoy a full and unrestricted 
hope we must be freed from all doubts concerning 
our fate in the world to come. "We can have this 
freedom by leading such lives here as will merit the 
divine approval hereafter. God will not set his 
seal on wroug-doing; only the just and worthy can 
satisfy his standard. When conscious that we 
are acting in conformity with his laws, as far as 
in our power, we must be fervent in hope, never 
doubting or questioning the ultimate fulfilment of 
an eternal promise. Faith must ever shine 
brightly, and burn with incandescent glow. 

86 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

Too many indeed hold the solemn verities con- 
cerning the hereafter in a sort of half conscious- 
ness, believing in them, yet nevertheless not fully 
realizing them. They must flame within us, set- 
ting our whole moral and intellectual nature on 
fire, sending a life current of energy through every 
part of our being, arousing us to impetuous action 
and to sustained effort born of strong conviction. 

The satisfying sense of immortality must be 
achieved, must be brought home to us by a con- 
tinual pursuit after loftier ideals than those of 
earth. It cannot be read in the pages of a book, 
whether of nature or revelation. Even gazing on 
Jesus issuing from the tomb is not a sufficiency to 
confirm belief and will not give us the faith that 
yields peace. There must be fellowship with the 
Christ of the Eesurrection before we can feel the 
power of Immortality. We must go over to him 
now on the divine side, before we can be assured 
of the eternal side. It is when, as Aristotle says, 
"we think the thoughts of the immortals and live 
in every act up to the noblest parts of us," that 
all our uncertainty gives place to a calm and 
unwavering assurance. 

A full predication of immortality can only be 
made through the moral and spiritual faculties. 
"We must get beyond the body and the ties that 

87 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

bind to earth if we would conceive the full force 
of belief in the hereafter and emphasize it in 
the inner consciousness of the soul. Milton point- 
edly says: "He who would write a great poem 
must himself make his life a poem. ,, To know 
immortality we must live for it. 

In the time of trial we have always a comfort in 
the conviction that we are suffering in accordance 
with the Divine Will, that not even a hair can fall 
from our heads without his consent. If we bow 
in meek submission to the power of an all-loving 
Father, we may be sure that he will not forget the 
obedience of his children, but will reward their 
fidelity and love. 

Through the Cross we come to the Crown. He 
himself taught us obedience and resignation to 
the heavenly decree. He came upon earth in the 
form of a man, suffered as a man and in the end 
sacrificed his life that mankind might eternally 
live. 

We rest secure in the faith of his promises and 
his love. Friends may desert us, the world come 
up and pass over us, trampling upon all that we 
hold sacred and dear, but the thought that soon we 
shall be united with him and receive the reward of 
our actions here, buoys us up with hope to submit 
cheerfully to all trials and sorrows, in the sub- 

88 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

lime expectation of what is to come, when we 
shall have finally passed from the cares of earth 
to where pain of parting from loved ones will 
never be experienced. 

A fond mother goes down into the grave of 
earth with the benediction of her children npon the 
sainted dust, or it may be an indulgent father is 
accompanied by the sighs of love to the portals of 
the tomb, or perhaps a dear sister leaves the per- 
fume of her memory to scent with its fragrance the 
weary path of those left behind, or a manly brother 
on whose strength we could rely when needed 
most, or a husband is removed in the zenith of 
his powers, passes away and breaks the tie of 
a hallowed union. For all these we sorrow, and 
refuse to be divorced from our grief, but like the 
beam of the evening sun through a winter's rain- 
cloud comes the holy consolation that the loved 
ones have only gone before for a little space, that 
they still live in a fairer realm, separated from us 
only by the veil of the flesh. Their faculties are 
now developed, they have been promoted in the 
scale of being to a point beyond our highest con- 
ception. 

The loss may be that of a little child. We look 
upon its waxen form, its motionless body so lately 
full of life. Its prattling tongue has been hushed 

89 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
on earth, but we know that God has called it to 
join its music with the angel choirs, and has 
stamped the glory of the heavenly immortality 
upon its stainless brow. 

Earthly losses of loved ones may for a time 
make the potion of life bitter, but faith in the 
ultimate future turns it into a draught of sweet- 
ness which we would not dash from our lips. 
"For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, 
worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal 
weight of glory." 

Earth's desolation will soon give place to life 
and beauty, its loneliness to companionship, its 
silence to the blended harmony of the spheres, 
chanting the music of a glorious eternity. Our 
feet will soon come to the bank of the shadowy 
river of the Great Divide. We must plunge into 
its chilly waters to reach the farther shore, but 
the blessed hope comes to hold us up that when 
we emerge on the other side we shall enter the 
flowery land of immortality, the home of ever- 
lasting youth and beauty, where the dear ones will 
be waiting to welcome us to the participation of 
its never-ending joys. With them we shall put 
on the robes of eternal life to experience the felic- 
ity of the blest in the mansions of the Master. 
Then shall we know that our friends were not lost, 

90 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

but translated to the happy state to repose for- 
ever in the bosom of their God. Let this beautiful 
faith strengthen and comfort us now and it will 
draw us to our kindred with the magnet of a holier 
affection. 

Well would it be if we could all implant deeply 
in our souls the faith in an immortality which 
Tennyson possessed when he so feelingly and con- 
sciously wrote of the death of his friend, Fitz- 
gerald : 

Past, in sleep away 

By night, into the deeper night. 

The deeper night? A clearer day. 

Yes, the night of death is but the dawn of a clearer 
day, when the visions will become realities in the 
all-enlightening sunlight of God's presence. 

Think of the sublime confidence, the spiritual 
faith of Browning, when he voiced this sentiment : 

. . . Though I stoop 
Into a dark, tremendous sea of cloud, 
It is but for a time. I press God's lamp 
Close to my breast; its splendors, soon or late, 
Will pierce the gloom. I shall emerge somewhere. 

The belief in an immortality beyond the vale of 
earth furnishes us many sources of consolation 
and helps us to bear patiently the many trials of 
our present state. We know that wrongs will be 
righted, that what is obscure now will then be 
plain, that imperfections will be remedied into per- 

91 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

fection, that there will be no injustice in the king- 
dom of the just King. But no conception or ideal 
affords us greater delight than the anticipation 
that the hereafter will furnish an arena for the 
full development of intellectual powers curtailed 
here and closed in by the grossness of matter. 

If the thought that the mind would go out like 
an expiring taper could impress itself upon us we 
should be truly wretched, and our mental capacity 
be still more narrow and confined, overshadowed 
by the darkness of such a thought. But faith 
comes to reason's aid and tells us that beyond the 
grave the mental powers will be enlarged, that the 
soul will ever progress upwards to limitless 
heights, soaring amid the realms of the infinite in 
the golden light of an all-encompassing knowledge. 
Here the soul is imprisoned by narrow boundaries, 
fettered by the clog of the material body, there, 
freed from the incubus, it can wing its flight to the 
throne of the Eternal to learn the secrets of all 
mysteries from the source of all wisdom. 

Death does not deny our cherished wishes, does 
not dash all hope to pieces like a frail bark against 
the rocks, but it opens wide the door to let us into 
a glorious fulfilment of aspirations, where every 
hope is realized, every ambition satisfied, where 
light and power will be given to us to see and to 

92 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

accomplish. With quickened mind we shall be 
enabled to grasp all difficulties, and solve all prob- 
lems, and as progress is the condition of happiness, 
the spiritual growth and development will con- 
stitute the elemental joy of the celestial state. 

Immortality is essential to every hope inspired 
by religion. Faith in the life beyond is the es- 
sence, the being of religion. Without this faith 
all beliefs from the cosmogony of the savage to the 
transcendent worship of the Christian would totter 
and fall. What is religion but an acknowledgment 
of a life to come, a form of service to propitiate 
and intercede with an Unknown Power, in the con- 
sciousness that there is an existence after death. 
Every child of man, no matter what the form of 
his worship, by such form testifies to his belief in 
an immortality. 

The Indian prays to the Great Spirit and thinks 
of the souls of his people wandering in the "happy 
hunting grounds, ' ' which term is but another name 
for the Indian heaven. 

The dusky-browed cannibal of the South Sea 
Islands, bows down to a block of wood or stone, 
and in so doing proclaims his faith in a power not 
of earth. 

The Chinese with his joss-sticks and incense 
gives tacit proof of his belief in the immortal. To 

93 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

him Confucius dwells in the mansions of the blest 
whence his spirit rules and guides his people on 
earth. 

Buddha is not dead to the Hindu, nor Mohammed 
to the Arab. They have passed beyond to the 
great hereafter, and their followers ever long for 
communion with them in the Spirit land. Thus all 
religion finds its consummation, the finality of its 
object in immortality; otherwise there would be 
no religion in the world. 

The avowed atheist professes unbelief and the 
agnostic will tell you that he "does not know," 
but deep down in the hearts of both is the inner 
consciousness that death does not end all, that 
there is an existence beyond the tomb. The heart 
of man is so constituted that it ever yearns after 
something which earth cannot give. This ' ' some- 
thing' ' immortality only can supply. The void in 
every human breast can only be filled in the life 
that lies beyond the river of time. The yearning 
and the void constitute the best testimony, in fact 
give irrefutable proof that the grave is not the 
goal of existence. 

Man is too great to be cribbed, cabined and con- 
fined by the narrow limits of earth with its finite 
lines. He must have the boundless infinitude of 
eternity for his spirit to roam at will ; nothing less 

94 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

can satisfy his capacious desires. He may ascend 
the thrones of sovereigns, walk the palaces of 
princes, delve into the mines of science, gather the 
harvests of wealth, abrogate to himself power 
over his fellow beings ; nevertheless, he is not con- 
tent, nothing can satisfy, he ever wants more, and 
this more eternity only can supply. "What is not 
eternal is unequal to his boundless desire. 

There is no contentment on earth, because it is 
not the true home. It is but a place of pilgrimage 
or preparation for a higher and purer state. To 
many indeed the pilgrimage is a penance and not a 
privilege. About all the comfort they have is the 
consoling hope of the life to come. Hardshrps, 
privations and deepest misery are the lot of the 
vast majority. Even where character is irre- 
proachable, the aggregate of suffering frequently 
far transcends the moiety of ephemeral happiness 
arising from mere physical life or social relations, 
for often the good are sorely tried in the crucible 
of suffering. They come forth, however, purged 
and purified from the corruptions of the flesh. 
The transitory happiness they enjoy, now and 
then, and which makes life tolerable, arises chiefly 
from their strong faith in a final adjustment of 
the earthly balances in the weighing-place of eter- 
nity. They bear with fortitude the ills that come, 

95 . 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

because they feel the day is approaching when 
God will manifest His justice to all and apportion 
to every one his reward in the form of compensa- 
tion for suffering, the medal of victory for a well 
spent life of virtuous action and honest endeavor. 

Take away hope inspired by faith in immortal- 
ity and what would remain to make life desirable 
or worth living! Where would be the motive in 
existence at all? There would be nothing worth 
while, and the grave of oblivion would be wel- 
comed to end the horrors of such a nightmare life. 
The hope of immortality is the basis of any little 
happiness experienced here below and that which 
gives us patience under trials is the thought that 
in the better future all will yet be well. 

It is unbelief in such a future state that impels 
men to deeds of recklessness and drives them to 
the insane asylum, and often to the grave of the 
suicide. They lose faith and consequently cour- 
age to face their difficulties, and so, foolishly think- 
ing to end their troubles, they rush to self-destruc- 
tion. But they will awaken to a terrible reckoning. 
For them immortality will not have the sweet 
rewards of those who "fought the good fight and 
kept the faith"; but the consciousness of that 
cowardice that led them to "fly from the ills they 
had and to rush to others that they knew not of. ' ' 

96 



A COMFORTING BELIEF 

No doubt it is hard to bear wrongs, calumnies 
and contumely, hard to stand up under the lashes 
of a merciless world, and none can do it unless 
they call faith to their assistance. 

Shakespeare says : 

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, 
The insolence of office and the spurns 
That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 
When he himself might his quietus make, 
With a bare bodkin? 

The brave man never falters in the fight, never 
loses his faith or his love, but the coward blanches 
at the thought of what may come and tries every 
subterfuge to escape. When the latter is cornered 
he does not hew his way out as a true man 
should, but gives in and destroys himself rather 
than face the consequences of his misdeeds. He 
has neither faith in himself nor faith in God, and 
in trying to escape wretchedness temporal pre- 
cipitates himself into a wretchedness eternal. 

The man who has confidence in himself and faith 
in God can surmount all obstacles and overcome 
every difficulty, for God assists him in the struggle, 
and he can look forward to death not with "pale 
terror and blanching fear, ' ' but with a courageous 
heart believing that it will admit him into a sphere 
of greater usefulness. 

97 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

There is no time when the consoling power of 
the trnth of immortality comes with such comfort 
as in the hour of death. There is nothing to fear 
for those of faith. The dark shores of time are 
being left behind and the soul is flying to the land 
of never-ending joys, the home of immortality, to 
dwell forever with God and the loved ones gone 
before. 

How triumphantly true it is : 

The men of grace have found 

Glory begun below, 
Celestial fruit on earthly ground 

From faith and hope may grow. 
The hill of Zion yields 

A thousand sacred sweets, 
Before we reach the heavenly hills 

Or walk the golden streets. 

Some years since, at the grave of his brother, 
an infidel orator paid an eloquent though uncon- 
scious attestation to a belief in immortality. He 
said : ' ' Life is a narrow vale between the cold and 
barren peaks of two eternities ; we strive in vain 
to look beyond the heights, we cry aloud and the 
only answer is the echo of our wailing cry. From 
the voiceless lips of the unreplying dead there 
comes no word, but in the night of death Hope sees 
a star and listening Love can hear the rustling of 
a wing/' 



Light After Darkness 



There is a land immortal, 

The beautiful of lands; 
Beside its ancient portal 

A silent sentry stands; 
He only can undo it, 

And open wide the door; 
And mortals who pass through it 

Are mortals never more. 

— Thomas MacKellar. 



The day is cold, and dark and dreary; 
It rains, and the wind is never weary; 
The vine still clings to the mouldering walls, 
And at every gust a dead leaf falls, 
And the day is dark and dreary. 

My life is cold, and dark and dreary, 
It rains, and the wind is never weary; 
My thoughts still cling to the mouldering past, 
But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast, 
And the days are dark and dreary. 

Be still, sad heart ! and cease repining, 
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining; 
Thy fate is the common fate of all, 
Into each life some rain must fall, 

Some days must be dark and dreary. 

— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



CHAPTER IV 

Light After Darkness 

Man's earthly life is a checkered scene thrown 
npon the canvas of time, here the light, there the 
shade, each alternating to make np the composite 
picture. 

Life, indeed, is in keeping with the phenomena 
which nature unfolds in the revolution of planets, 
worlds and systems around the orbits of their 
being. 

* The light gives way to darkness, the darkness 
in turn flees before the succeeding beams and thus 
the eternal round goes on ever merging into the 
consummation of the ages, without rest, halt or 
variation from the everlasting order. 

The spring puts forth the flowers and plants, 
the summer nurtures them into lusty strength, the 
autumn garners their fruition and the winter 
gathers them into the tomb of existence. 

And yet there is no death. What men call by 
that name is simply change — change into another 
form of existence to carry on the scheme of univer- 
sal wisdom. 

103 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Human life is but a part, though the highest 
part of God's eternal plan, and must fulfil its 
destiny in common with the rest of creation. The 
grave is not its goal, there is something beyond 
and to this great beyond all are hastening. 

Man must fulfil the end of his being — that end 
is union with its source. To reach it he must expe- 
rience many and various vicissitudes. There 
are days of darkness, days of travail, when the 
star of hope seems to be surrounded with the 
gloom of a perpetual night. Yet beyond the black- 
ness there is light and its beams eventually break 
through to illumine the path that leads from the 
vale of sorrow to the shining heights of happiness. 

Were all darkness, man would be lost in the 
midnight of gloom; were all light he would be 
consumed in the effulgence of its glare. Each 
alternates to enable him to steer clear of destruc- 
tion and work out the eternal designs of an all- 
wise Providence. 

The shower is as necessary as the sunshine to 
conserve the laws of nature. And the immutable 
transition from the one to the other is a fitting 
illustration of life's varied phases. The dark 
clouds, the heavy, leaden skies, the roaring storms 
and the fierce tornadoes are typical of physical 
pains and disorders, of mental depressions and 

104 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

worries, of deep agitations and soul-harrowing 
trials when the world turns its hardest face 
towards us and friendship dies, when prosperity 
takes wings and hope droops its head and faith is 
stretched to the utmost tension. 

This is the test in the crucible of suffering, and 
out of it we must come purified and refined, free 
from all alloy of unworthiness or else emerge as 
dross to be thrown on the scrap-heap of useless- 
ness. It is suffering that purges men's souls and 
not the ease, comfort and pleasures of a butterfly 
existence nurtured by the poisonous nectars and 
sweets of forbidden fruits growing on the branches 
of the tree of sin. 

And 'tis only after the suffering we can enjoy 
the peace. The light can only be appreciated in 
contrast to the darkness, for were light ever with 
us it would become monotonous and dull and we 
could not realize its grandeur as we do when it 
alternates with gloom. 

Only after the storm can we fittingly relish the 
calm. The saccharine tastes of the sweet would 
vitiate the palate but for the acidity of the sour. 

By the same analogy hunger is the best sauce, 
for it gives zest to appetite. The glutton can never 
have a feast, whereas the abstemious man can 
relish the coarsest of fare. 

105 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

If we were to have eternal sunshine it would 
« 
blind our vision to its own splendor. Therefore 

the shade is necessary as a contrast, to accentuate 

the glory of the brightness. 

The sunshine is emblematic of days of prosper- 
ity when gladness fills the soul and the whole being 
is attuned to the divine harmony within, when the 
spirit is as tuneful and as full of melody as the 
birds warbling their matin hymns at the gates of 
morn, when peace like a brooding dove spreads its 
white wings over every tumult of the heart and 
hushes all to rest beneath its gentle influence. 

Yet anon storms will sweep up and disturb the 
universal quiet, the tempests will rage, the winds 
howl and the billows lash themselves to fury, but 
their wrath will expend itself in force, their anger 
will subside and again the sun will burst through 
the rift of clouds to illumine earth with his beams. 

So it is with human life. The changes in the 
aspects of nature are not more variant than those 
in our everyday existence. 

There are all the gradations from the peaceful 
calm to the raging storm, from the sunlight of 
noonday to the darkness of midnight, and just as in 
inanimate creation, the storms purify the atmos- 
phere and hence bring growth and development 
to the products of the earth, so, by the grace of 

106 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

God, "Our light affliction which is but for a 
moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and 
eternal weight of glory. ' ' 

As the tempest sweeps around the palace of the 
king as well as the hovel of the laborer, so afflic- 
tions and cares and worries and trials visit rich 
and poor alike. No one is exempt. Wealth for a 
time may ward off threatening evils in the way of 
worldly success, but it is powerless to counteract 
the visitations of an inscrutable Providence or 
thwart the signs of an Almighty Power. Afflic- 
tions will come, both mental and physical, and they 
must be borne whether in patience or in repining 
at the decrees of fate. 

"Who can minister to a mind diseased V 9 asks 
Macbeth, and the answer is yet to come. There is 
no balsam, no healing potion in the pharmacopia 
of experience to apply to a mental wound, neither 
can gold bribe, nor skill ward off, nor beauty charm 
physical decay or allay bodily pain. No one is 
immune, or impervious to the darts and javelins 
hurled by the gaunt hands of disease. Not a heart 
is left untouched, not a circle left unbroken, not a 
barrier left uncrossed, not a sanctuary is too 
sacred for the entrance of suffering and sorrow. 

The ermine and cloth of gold of the monarch can 
no more hide the wounds of humanity than the 

107 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

tattered rags of the mendicant. Affliction is no 
respecter of persons, bnt sooner or later it calls 
at every door. Yon may fancy that it visits you 
oftener than yonr neighbor and tarries with yon 
for a greater space, bnt this is a fallacy on yonr 
part. Misfortune very often flies on invisible 
wings, so that you cannot see it enter the homes of 
your neighbors, nor sting the heart and scourge 
the souls of its victims. 

You may think that they are free while you only 
are suffering, but could you see beneath the mask 
of the smiling face and instead of the honeyed 
words that fall from the glib tongue hear the 
groanings of the inner consciousness, you would 
realize that your own sorrows are indeed light. 

Your cross may be rugged and heavy, you may 
be tottering beneath its weight, about to sink 
beneath the fearful strain, so that you would hail 
with joy an interchange with some one else to all 
appearance less heavily burdened. If necroman- 
cer's rod or magician's wand could affect such 
change you would quickly find that the cross of 
your neighbor which you considered so light was 
harder to bear than the one with which you parted, 
and you would be anxious, nay, eager to get the old 
one back again. The Changed Cross, by Mrs. 
Charles Hobart, sweetly sings this truth : 

108 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

It was a time of sadness — and my heart, 
Although it knew and loved the better part, 
Felt wearied with the conflict and the strife, 
And all the needful discipline of life. 

And while I thought on these — as given to me 
My trial tests of faith and love to be, 
It seemed as if I never could be sure 
That faithful to the end I should endure. 

And thus no longer trusting to His might 
"Who says, "we walk by faith and not by sight," 
Doubting, and almost yielding to despair, 
The thought arose, My cross I cannot bear! 

Far heavier its weight must surely be, 
Than those of others which I daily see, 
Oh, if I might another burden choose, 
Methinks I should not fear my crown to lose. 

A solemn silence reigned on all around, 
E'en nature's voices uttered not a sound, 
The evening shadows seemed of peace to tell, 
And sleep upon my weary spirit fell. 

A moment's pause — and then a heavenly light 
Beamed full upon my wondering, raptured sight, 
Angels on silvery wings seemed everywhere, 
And angels' music thrilPd the balmy air. 

Then One, more fair than all the rest to see, 
One — to whom all the others bowed the knee, 
Came gently to me as I trembling lay, 
And— "Follow Me," He said; "I am the Way." 

Then speaking thus, He led me far above, 
And there, beneath a canopy of love, 
Crosses of divers shape and size were seen, 
Larger and smaller than mine own had been. 

And one there was most beauteous to behold, 
A little one, with jewels set in gold; 
Ah, this methought I can with comfort wear. 
For it will be an easy one to bear. 

And so the little cross I quickly took, 
But all at once my frame beneath it shook; 
The sparkling jewels, fair were they to see, 
But far too heavy was their weight for me. 

109 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

This may not be, I cried — and looked again 
To see if any there could ease my pain, 
But one by one I pass'd them slowly by, 
Till on a lovely one I cast my eye. 

Fair flowers around its sculptur'd form entwin'd, 
And grace and beauty in it seem'd combin'd; 
Wondering I gazed — and still I wonder'd more 
To think so many should have passed it o'er. 

But oh, that form, so beautiful to see, 
Soon made its hidden sorrows known to me; 
Thorns lay beneath those flowers and colors fair, 
Sorrowing I said, This cross I may not bear. 

And so it was with each and all around, 

Not one to suit my need could there be found; 

Weeping — I laid each heavy burden down, 

As my Guide gently said, "No cross — no crown.'* 

At length to Him I raised my saddened heart; 
He knew its sorrows, bade its doubts depart; 
"Be not afraid," he said, "but trust in Me." 
"My perfect love shall now be shown to thee." 

And then, with lighten'd eyes, and willing feet, 
Again I turned my earthly cross to meet, 
With forward footsteps turning not aside, 
For fear some hidden evil might betide. 

And there, in the prepar'd, appointed way, 
Listening to hear and ready to obey, 
A cross I quickly found of plainest form, 
With only words of love inscribed thereon. 

With thankfulness I raised it from the rest, 
And joyfully acknowledg'd it the best, 
The only one of all the many there, 
That I could feel was good for me to bear. 

And while I thus my chosen one confess'd, 
I saw a heavenly brightness on it rest, 
And as I bent, my burden to sustain, 
I recognized my own old cross again! 

But oh, how different did it seem to be, 
Now I had learned its preciousness to see; 
No longer could I unbelieving say, 
Perhaps another is a better way. 

110 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

Ah no! henceforth my one desire shall be, 
That He who knows me best should choose for me, 
And so, whate'er His love sees good to send, 
I'll trust it's best — because He knows the end. 

Human life is an instrument of many strings, 
and fate plays npon first one and then another, 
producing a strange gamut. At one time a music 
is evoked, sweet as angelic dreams, its sweet 
diapason enchanting brain and heart and soul. At 
another the chords give forth a strident, ear- 
splitting discord which destroys the harmonies of 
nature. Very often the notes blend in such a way 
that we are almost unable to detect when harmony 
ceases and discord takes its place. 

Life is like a wild iEolian harp of many a joyous strain, 
Yet under all there runs a wail as if of souls in pain. 

The brightest day has some cloud to mar the 
clearness of its horizon. Beneath the smoothest 
current there is a swirling eddy. There is no 
landscape so fair as not to be marred by some 
defect in perspective or coloring, and so there is 
no life so free, so calm, so peaceful, so happy, that 
some worry or cross or trial or little affliction, 
whether mental or bodily, does not enter to temper 
and tone the whole. 

The most beautiful colors are not obtained from 
one pigment, but by a mixture of many, and often 
it is the composition of the dullest with the bright- 
Ill 



AFTER DEATH— WHi.T? 
est that produces the most pleasing effects. In 
the same fashion it takes a little sorrow to round 
out and perfect life, a little darkness to mix with 
the sunshine to modify its glare. 

The wise accept suffering willingly, knowing its 
necessity to enable them to reach higher and better 
things. They realize that only through the Cross 
can they hope to wear the Crown ; therefore they 
receive the trials of life in a Christian spirit, with- 
out repining or murmuring, consoled by the 
promise : ' ' My grace is sufficient for thee. ' ' 

No affliction is too heavy for the Christian to 
bear, for his faith upholds the burden. He does 
not estimate his suffering from a worldly view- 
point, but in spirit he ascends the mountain of 
sorrow on which Christ suffered and died, and 
looks upon his trials in the light radiating from 
the Cross, and then he clearly sees that all is a 
part of God's great disciplinary plan by which he 
makes his servants perfect. 

"When the eyes of the soul are closed to things 
temporal, but open to things eternal, physical and 
mental pain work for the highest moral good of 
the individual. The pain in such cases is not suf- 
fering. It is but the correction of evil, the polish- 
ing as it were of life's mirror so that it may reflect 
more clearly the image of the Master. 

112 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

Jacob sorrowed grievously for his sons, and in 
his short human sight mournfully ex-claimed, — 
81 "All these things are against me," not realizing 
that God was there working out the salvation of 
the old patriarch's family in His own inscrutable 
way. 

Blessings have come to men and nations in most 
cases in the guise of sorrow. "Wars have had to 
devastate the land to bring about the reign of 
Peace. 

When Paul looked out over the troubled world, 
he saw, what many since have seen, 

Truth forever on the scaffold — 
Wrong forever on the throne, 

but with faith that looked beyond the clouds, the 
great apostle discovered — 

God within the shadow 
Keeping watch above his own, 

and seizing his pen he wrote, — "All things work 
together for good to them that love God. ' ' 

Yes, those who love God, who have the divine 
spirit within, see the wisdom of his works and 
bow to the justice of his designs, knowing that "He 
doeth all things well. ' ' 

How much higher than Jacob was Paul! The 
faith of Paul took hold of eternal things and he 
gazed through the eyes of the spirit, while Jacob 

113 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

looked only through the corporeal orbs of vision 
and, therefore, could not see the divine plan in his 
affliction. 

Before you can accept suffering in the proper 
spirit and turn it to your advantage you must 
bring home to your heart and soul that whatever 
may be the direct cause, God has knowledge of it, 
and it is a part of His eternal plan. 

Behind the agency of suffering there is the throb 
of tenderness, the pulse-beat of love, the guiding 
influence of an Infinite Mind which controls the 
destiny of the soul. 

Affliction is as necessary for purification as 
intense heat is for virgin ore. "Without it mortals 
would forget their mission and their dependence 
upon a higher power. They would have nothing 
to restrain them and so would rush on to the 
precipice of destruction and totter over its banks 
to be lost forever in the abysses below. 

Paul looked upon affliction in contrast with the 
glory that shall be revealed; hence he did not 
intend to trifle with our pain or insult our grief 
when he called our affliction "light." 

Of course, there are times when it is well-nigh 
impossible for us to look upon our sufferings as 
light, times when the soul is bowed down so much 
it seems the load of sorrow is too heavy for mortal 

114 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

strength to bear, when the heart is crushed with 
woe, when cherished ones desert and friends 
depart, when the light of home goes out and dark- 
ness takes its place by the desolate fireside, when 
hope takes wings and flees away, when faith itself 
totters and almost falls to earth, in a word there 
are periods when all the freighted argosies of life 
seem to lie battered wrecks on the shore of exist- 
ence, and we stand powerless in the face of im- 
pending ruin. 

"lis then we must call to our aid trust in God to 
keep us from sinking into the blackened abyss of 
despair. We must fly to the light of his love as 
the beacon star that shall guide our steps along 
the rugged way to the haven of peace where, after 
the storm, broods the eternal calm. 

In the darkest days before the Civil War, when 
there seemed no way of deliverance for our broth- 
ers in black, Fred Douglas, at a crowded meeting, 
depicted the terrible condition of his race. Every- 
thing was against his people. One political party 
had gone down on its knees to slavery, and the 
other proposed not to abolish it anywhere, but 
only to restrict it. The Supreme Court had given 
judgment against the black man as such. Fred 
Douglas drew a picture of his race writhing under 
the lash of the overseer, and trampled upon by 

115 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

heartless men. As he went on with his despair- 
ing words, a great horror of darkness seemed to 
settle down on the audience. The orator even 
uttered the cry for blood. There was no other 
relief. And then he showed that there was no 
relief even in that. Everything, every influence, 
every event was gathering, not for good, but for 
evil about the doomed race. It seemed as if they 
were fated to destruction. Just at the instant 
when the cloud was most heavy over the audience, 
there slowly arose in the front seat an old black 
woman. Her name was "Sojourner Truth.' ' 
She had given it to herself. Far and wide she 
was known as an African prophetess. Every eye 
was on her. The orator paused. Beaching out 
towards him her long bony fingers, as every eye 
followed her pointing, she cried out : ' ' Frederick, 
is God dead?" 

It was a lightning flash upon that darkness. The 
clouds began to break, and faith, hope and pa- 
tience returned with the idea of and trust in an 
everliving and a patient God. 

Surely we can bear patiently when we hear the 
promise: "I will never leave thee, I will never 
forsake thee." These words of comfort bring 
balm to the troubled soul, assuage all griefs and 
enable us to bear up against all trials. 

116 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

A beautiful auecdote is told of Wendell Phil- 
lips, the famous orator, illustrating his lover-like 
devotion to his wife. At the close of a lecture 
engagement in a neighboring town his friends 
entreated him not to return to Boston. 

' 'The last train has left," they said, "and you 
will be obliged to take a carriage into the city. It 
is a sleety November night, cold and raw ; and you 
will have twelve miles of rough riding before you 
reach home. J ' 

To which he replied, "But at the other end of 
them I shall find Anne Phillips." 

You may be having a hard time. You may find 
your life journey like that cold midnight ride of 
the famous orator. But think, as he said, of the 
One you are to meet at the other end. Jesus 
said, "I will receive you unto myself, that where I 
am there ye may be also. ' ' Should not that prom- 
ise comfort you in the darkest hour? 

The experience of all believers in all ages bears 
testimony to the unfailing faithfulness with which 
Omnipotent, Omniscient Jehovah fulfils his prom- 
ises to all who put their trust in Him. Not one 
afflicted believer in any land or age has ever in the 
dark hour of sorrow and calamity gone to his 
Saviour for supporting grace and been disap- 
pointed. It is true that many, through unbelief, 

117 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

have at times been ready to call his faithfulness 
and sustaining grace in question — ' ' The Lord hath 
forsaken and my Lord hath forgotten,' ' — yet in no 
instance have these gloomy apprehensions ever 
been ultimately realized, but in every case the all- 
faithful Kedeemer has made his timely appear- 
ance for their relief, and convinced them that 
their gloomy fears were as groundless as they 
were unkind to him. As no case of depravity has 
ever transcended the regenerating and pardoning 
power of our Saviour, so no instance of affliction 
has ever occurred among his saints beyond his 
comforting power. 

How sad for those to whom all that remain of 
life are "the worm, the canker and the grief, " and 
for whom no beacon light shines from beyond 
the sea ! 

The deepest happiness is felt not by those who 
never suffered here, but by those who have passed 
through the experience of sorrow, and have been 
comforted. 

A story is told of a German baron who con- 
structed a great iEolian harp by stretching wires 
from tower to tower of his castle. When the harp 
was in readiness for the winds to move its strings, 
he listened for the music. But it was in the calm 
of summer, the still air could not vibrate the wires 

118 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

and they hung silent. Autumn came with its 
gentle breezes ; then there were faint murmurs of 
sound from the wires. At length the winter winds 
swept over the castled turrets and the great harp 
answered their touch in majestic bursts of music. 
The human heart may be likened to this harp. It 
does not yield its grandest music in the summer 
days of joy, but in the winter time of trial. 

The sweetest songs of earth have been sung in 
sorrow, have spontaneously burst forth from 
breaking hearts, and so in like manner the rich- 
est, rarest treasures of character come forth 
through pain and suffering. 

Even of Jesus we read, — "He was made perfect 
through suffering." This does not mean, of 
course, that there were evils in his nature which 
had to be expelled by the heat of trial or dross in 
the gold of his being that only the fire of suf- 
fering could remove. The meaning is, there were 
elements in his sinless humanity which could be 
brought to full ripeness only through pain. 

Nature is refreshed by storms. In May the 
clouds pour forth their torrents of rain, the 
lightnings flash, the thunders crash, the trees and 
plants and foliage bend before the fury of the 
gale. The flowers try to seek a shelter in the 
bosom of mother nature to protect their petals 

119 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

from the force of the angry tempest which sweeps 
around them. 

Anon, however, the winds lessen their fury and 
settle down to a gentle zephyr, the rains cease, the 
thunder is no longer heard, nor the lightning seen, 
and the sun comes forth from his house of clouds 
and smilingly looks down to earth, the landscape 
puts on its brightest garments after its bath, the 
trees and plants and flowers assume their gayest 
colors and exude a fragrance which perfumes the 
purified air, everything is bright and fresh and 
sweet and pleasing to the eye and grateful to 
the senses. 

But contrast the May storms with those of 
November. In November the thunders roll and 
the rains fall, but instead of brightening and 
refreshing, they sweep all away and leave nothing 
behind but bare wastes and stagnant pools. Such 
too, is the difference when affliction falls on hearts 
without true faith in God and on those who abide 
in Christ. 

Eemember the promise, "When I bring a cloud 
over the earth, it shall come to pass, that the bow 
shall be in the cloud.' ' God reserves "a blessing 
for the eyes that weep. ' ' The darkest night must 
end at sunrise. The icy barriers of winter will 
melt in the warm summer sunlight. 

120 



LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS 

Keep your hold on God, come what may. When 
a ship loses her canvas in a gale, she can still be 
kept ont of the trough of the sea by her rudder ; 
when the rudder goes she has still her anchor left, 
but if the cable snaps she is swept hopelessly on 
the rocks. So when your hold on God is gone, all 
is gone. The most fatal wreck that can overtake 
you in times of sorrow is the wreck of faith, but 
if in the darkest hour you can trust God though 
he slay, and firmly believe that he ' ' chastens you 
for profit, ' ' you are anchored to the very throne of 
Love and will come off more than conqueror. 

Eelieve your own suffering hearts by turning 
the flood of grief upon some work of practical use- 
fulness. Working is better than weeping. Work 
till the last morning breaks, and in that clear light 
you will read the meaning of many of your 
sorrows. 

When our friends are taken from us, our 
bereavement is a call, not to bitter weeping, but 
to new duty. 

It bids us do the work that they laid down — 

Take up the song where they broke off the strain ; 
So journeying till we reach the heavenly town 
Where are laid up our treasures and our crown 
And our lost loved ones will be found again. 

Sitting down to brood over our sorrows, the 
darkness deepens about us and our little strength 

121 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

changes to weakness ; but if we turn away from 
the gloom and take up the tasks of comforting and 
helping each other, the light will come again and 
we shall grow strong. 

When all our hopes are gone, 
'Tis well our hands must still keep toiling on, 

For others' sake; 
For strength to bear is found in duty done, 
And he is blessed indeed who learns to make 
The joy of others cure his own heartache. 



A Symposium on Immortality 
Best Thoughts from the World's Greatest Thinkers 



CHAPTER V 

A Symposium on Immortality 

Best Thoughts from the World's Greatest Thinkers 

By T. C. Colekidge 
Either we have an immortal soul, or we have 
not. If we have not, we are beasts ; the first and the 
wisest of beasts, it may be; but still true beasts. 
We shall only differ in degree, and not in kind; 
just as the elephant differs from the slug. But 
by the concession of all the materialists of all the 
schools, or almost all, we are not of the same kind 
as beasts ; and this also we say from our own con- 
sciousness. Therefore, methinks, it must be the 
possession of a soul within us that makes the 

difference. 

# # # 

By Lord-Chancellor Erskine 

When I reflect that God has given to inferior 
animals no instincts of faculties that are not imme- 
diately subservient to the ends and purposes of 
their beings, I cannot but conclude that the reasons 
and faculties of man are bestowed upon the same 

125 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

principle and are connected with his superior 
nature. When I find him, therefore, endowed with 
his powers to carry, as it were, the line and rule to 
the most distant worlds, I consider it as conclusive 
evidence of a future and more exalted destination, 
because I cannot believe that the Creator of the 
Universe would depart from all the analogies of 
the lower creation, by gifting him with a capacity 
not only utterly useless, but destructive of his 
contentment and happiness, if his existence were 
to terminate in the grave. 



By John Fiske 

The only thing which cerebral physiology tells 
us, when studied with the aid of molecular physics, 
is against the materialist, as far as it goes. It 
tells us, that during the present life, although 
thought and feeling are always manifested in con- 
nection with a peculiar form of matter, yet by no 
possibility can thought and feeling be in any sense 
the products of matter. Nothing could be more 
grossly unscientific than the famous remark of 
Cabanis, that the brain secrets thought as the liver 
secretes bile. It is not even correct to say that 
thought goes on in the brain. What goes on in the 
brain is an amazingly complex series of molecular 

126 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

movements, with which thought and feeling are in 
some unknown way co-related, not as effects or as 
causes, but as concomitants . . . the material- 
istic assumption . . . that the life of the soul 
accordingly ends with the life of the body, is per- 
haps the most colossal instance of baseless assump- 
tion that is known to the history of philosophy. 

* # # 

By Dr. Lionel Beale 

After having studied the phenomena of living 
matter for a length of time, and with all the advan- 
tages I could obtain, the conviction has been forced 
on my mind that vital phenomena must be referred 
to an agency distinct from the physical forces of 
nature. Life is not a consequence of the organiza- 
tion of matter, but the cause. The recent attempts 
to interpret vital phenomena by physics are ter- 
ribly retrograde. Such interpretation cannot be 
accepted unless well-established truths which can- 
not be overthrown are purposely ignored, and old 
ideas, long since proved false, are received as true. 



By Dr. John Bascom 

No man can well accept the moral law as one of 
spiritual insight, and not feel at once that the 

127 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

years of eternity must be given to it in which, to 
clear itself ; that a long day of fulfilment and peace 
is to follow and level up the end with the beginning. 
Men are now called on by this law of dnty to stand 
on the verge of time, to cast all things behind them, 
and in the faith of implicit obedience to fling them- 
selves on the openhanded future. If this future 
drops them into oblivion, what then? They have 
played the part, on the highest stage of the world, 

of a moral maniac. 

# # # 

By Dr. Martineau 

"When I find him endowed with powers to carry, 
as it were, the line and rule to the most distant 
words, I consider it as conclusive evidence of a 
future and more exalted distinction, because I can- 
not think that the Creator of the Universe would 
depart from all the analogies of the lower creation 
in the formation of the highest creatures by gift- 
ing him with a capacity not only utterly useless, 
but destructive of his contentment and happiness, 
if his existence were to terminate in the grave. 
AVhat need of the mystic realm of Beethoven's 
music, and Goethe's drama, and Dante's poetry? 
Of endowment equal to the achievement of these 
things, and the impulse to achieve them, for a 
being thus restricted, what need 1 

128 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 
By Phillips Beooks 

I linger and yet I mnst not linger. Oh, my 
friends! Oh, my fellowmen! it is not very long 
that we shall be here. It is not very long. This 
life for which we are so careful — it is not very 
long ; and yet it is so long, because long, long after 
we have passed away out of men's sight and out 
of men's memory, the world, with something that 
we have left within it, will be going on still. It is 
so long, because long after the city and the world 
have passed away we shall go on somewhere, some- 
how, the same beings still, carrying into the depths 
of eternity something that this world has done for 
us that no other world could do; something of 
goodness, to get now, that will be of value to us a 
million years hence, that we never could get unless 
we got it in the short years of this earthly life. 

By Dr. N. S. Shaler 

To those who hold to the illogical idea that we 
can observe all that happens in even the simplest 
natural fact, the process of death may appear as 
a sufficient basis for denying the possibility of 
immortality. But the naturalist who has learned 
to limit his confidence in his discovering powers 
will not be ready to say that these facts do more 

129 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

than raise a certain presumption against the con- 
tinuance of a mind after death. If he has made a 
study of those modes of change, occurring at what 
I have called critical points, he will be likely to sus- 
pect that much may take place in the revolution 
that evidently occurs in dissolution which he does 
not see at all. There is, it is true, nothing in the 
visible facts which in any way leads to the supposi- 
tion that the mind lives on after the breaking up 
of the body by which it is manifested. But no well- 
trained observer who has carefully remembered 
his experiences with phenomena, is likely to affirm 
that he finds in those of death anything that can 
fitly be termed proof that the mind does not 
survive. * * # 

By Dr. George Gordon" 

The proof of our immortality is not complete; 
but the evidence for it is so great that it would be 
an outrage upon life not to honor it with credence. 
AVhen we ask for trust here, we ask for no more 
than is demanded in almost all other departments 
of practical interest. . . . There is no other 
adequate explanation of the universality of the 
presence of the belief in immortality in the soul 
than the confession that it belongs to human faith, 
and that it is here to stay. . . . Men are not 

130 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

allowed to rest in the notion that they are chil- 
dren of a day. They are pilgrims of eternity, with 
thoughts that wander through immensity and 
affections that raven with immortal hunger. They 
move upon lines that have no end, and when true 
to their humanity transcend time. They support 
their enthusiasms out of the Infinite, and their 
work, well done, belongs to the universe. Thus 
faith in immortality lives in the better thought, in 
the nobler purpose, and in the loftier work of the 
world; lives on intrenched in the structure of 
man's being, surviving fear and doubt and open 
denial, and holding its place in human conscious- 
ness against the philosophies that preach the 
perishableness of the soul as securely as the great 
fort at the Pillars of Hercules. 



By Dr. Brooke Herford 

We know not how it is to be, or where. But 
somehow, somewhere, whether we wish for it or 
not, we know by the dumb craving of the ordered 
world, as well as by the unuttered hope of holiest 
souls, that Grod will yet fulfil us into something 
better than the fragments that we are. And so 
we wait, and work, and watch, and do the best we 
may, or bow our heads in sorrow that our doing is 

131 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

so much below our best — and as his laws ordain we 
let life go, or fall asleep, but always for some 
further greater life beyond the shadow and the 
sleeping. # # # 

By the Duke of Akgyle 

What life begins to need, to feel from within that 
it must find, shall eventually be supplied from 
without. And the completed outward conditions 
will awaken full response from within. The two 
meet and eventually are matched. The finished 
eye opens in the perfect light. The process of 
development through the ages is an evolution of 
the environment as well as of the life; the end 
shall be the best possible in the harmony of the two. 



By Frances Power Cobbe 

Why should we not thus catch a glimpse of the 
spiritual world through that half-open portal 
wherein our dying brother is passing? If the soul 
of man exists at all after the extinction of the life 
of the body, what is more probable than that it 
should begin at the very instant when the evil of 
the flesh is dropping off to exercise those spiritual 
powers of perception which we must suppose it to 
possess (else were it whole after life a blank), and 

132 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

to become conscious of other things than those of 
which our dim senses can take cognizance? If it 
is not destined to an eternity of solitude (an 
absurd hypothesis), its future companions may 
well be recognized at once, even as it goes forth to 
meet them. It seems almost a thing to be ex- 
pected, that some of them should be ready waiting 
to welcome it on the threshold 



By Victoe Hugo 

It is the misfortune of our time to place every- 
thing in this life. In giving to man for his sole 
end and aim the life of earth, you aggravate all his 
miseries by the final negation. And that which 
was only suffering — that is to say, the law of 
God — is changed to despair, the law of hell. The 
duty of us all — legislators, bishops, poets — is to 
help raise all faces toward heaven, to direct all 
souls toward the future life. Let us say, with high 
confidence, that no one has suffered unjustly, or 
in vain. Death is restitution. God appears at 
the end of all. It would not be worth while to live 
if we were to die entirely. That which alleviates 
labor and sanctifies toil is to have before us the 
vision of a better world through the darkness of 
this life. That world is to me more real than the 
chimera which we devour and which we call life. 

133 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

It is forever before my eyes. It is the supreme 
certainty of my reason, as it is the supreme con- 
solation of my soul. 



By Thomas Caklyle 

And seest thou therein any glimpse of immor- 
tality? heaven! Is the white tomb of our 
loved one, who died from our arms and must be 
left behind us there, which rises in the distance 
like a pale, mournfully receding milestone, to tell 
how many toilsome, uncheered miles we have jour- 
neyed on alone, but a pale spectral illusion? Is 
the lost friend still mysterious here, even as we 
are mysteriously here with God? Know of a 
truth that only the time-shadows have perished or 
are perishable and the real being of whatever was 
and whatever is and whatever will be, is even now 

and forever. . "~ 

* # # 

By Lyman Abbott 

I think of death as a glad awakening from this 
troubled sleep which we call life ; as an emancipa- 
tion from a world which, beautiful though it be, is 
still a land of captivity ; as a graduation from this 
primary department into some higher rank in the 
hierarchy of learning. I think of the dead as 

134 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

possessing a more splendid equipment for a larger 
life of diviner service than was possible to them 
on earth — a life in which I shall in due time join 
them if I am counted worthy of their fellowship in 
the life eternal. 

By Dr. Newman Smythe 

The direction of nature has been towards the 
coming and reign of the individual. The whole 
movement has been that way. At the present 
summit of it the individual man stands out as its 
supreme form, and with his face uplifted towards 
some radiant beyond. 

Life would not be carried out to completion on 
one of its main lines ; it would stop short and be 
turned back in one of its progressive and dominant 
principles, if individuality should be gained only 
to be lost, if the person should miserably perish 
and only the species survive, only the life of 

humanity continue. 

# * # 

By Dr. Theodoee Mugger 

A true and satisfying sense of immortality must 
be achieved. It cannot be taken second-hand. 
We cannot read it in the pages of a book, whether 
of nature or inspiration. We cannot even look 
upon the man Jesus issuing from the tomb and 

135 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

draw thence a faith that yields peace. There 
must be fellowship with the Christ of the resurrec- 
tion before we can feel its power. In other words, 
we must get over upon the divine side of life before 
we can be assured of eternal life. A full predica- 
tion of immortality can only be made through the 
moral and spiritual faculties. 

By R. W. Emekson 

I know not whence we draw the assurance of 
prolonged life, of a life which shoots that gulf we 
call death, and takes hold of what is real and 
abiding. Here is the wonderful thought. But 
whence came it ? Who put it in the mind 1 It was 
not I ; it was not you. It is elemental, belongs to 
thought and virtue, and whenever we have either, 
we see the beams of this light. When the Master 
of the universe has points to carry in his govern- 
ment he impresses his will in the structure of 

minds. 

# # # 

By Dk. Salmond 

The eye of man looks wistfully to the end. Life, 
like love, believes in its own immortality. Heart 
and mind cry for light upon what is beyond the 
grave. Nor do they cry in vain. They have their 

136 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

answer in themselves. They have it in the highest 
measure in those words of the Lord Jesus, into 
whose clear depths men have never ceased to look 
since they were first spoken, and from which they 
have never turned unsatisfied. 



By Dr. S. D. McConnell 

An endless human interest attaches to the ques- 
tion, so strong that however often it be abandoned, 
it must needs be once again renewed. It beckons 
while it eludes. There is no reason to believe that 
men will ever be content to sit down before it or to 
definitely abandon it as insoluble. 



By George Romanes 

Reason is not the only attribute of man, nor is 
it the only faculty which he habitually employs for 
the ascertainment of truth. Moral and spiritual 
faculties are of no less importance in their respect- 
ive spheres, even of every-day life. Faith, trust, 
taste, are as needful in ascertaining truth as to 
character and beauty as is reason. The wise 
Christian will answer, "I believe in the resurrec- 
tion of the dead, partly on grounds of reason, 
partly on those of intuition, but chiefly on both 

137 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

combined. So to speak, it is my whole character 
which accepts the whole system of which the doc- 
trine of personal immortality forms an essential 
part." 

By Prof. Wm. James 

Immortality is one of the great spiritual needs 
of man. There are individuals with a real passion 
for the matter, men and women for whom a life 
hereafter is a pungent craving, and the thought of 
it an obsession ; and in whom keenness of interest 
has bred an insight into the relations of the sub- 
ject that no one less penetrated with the mystery 

of it can attain. 

# # * 

By Goethe 

My belief in the immortality of the soul springs 
from the idea of activity ; for when I persevere to 
the end in a course of restless activity I have a 
sort of guarantee from Nature that, when the pres- 
ent form of my existence proves itself inadequate 
for the energizing of my spirit, she will provide 
another form more appropriate. When a man is 
seventy-five years old he cannot avoid now and 
then thinking of death. This thought, when it 
comes, leaves me in a state of perfect peace; for 
I have the most assured conviction that our soul is 

138 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

of an essence absolutely indestructible — an essence 
that works on from eternity to eternity. It is like 
the sun, which, to onr earthly eye, sinks and sets, 
but in reality never sinks, but shines on un- 
ceasingly. 

* * # 

Death Another Form of Birth 
By H. W. Thomas, D.D 

It seems to me, if we get a correct view of death, 
that it is only another form of birth — a kind of 
upward movement instead of the downward. Be- 
fore we came into this world we had our life in 
connection with the life of our mothers. And 
after reaching a point where it was possible to live 
independent of our mothers, we came into this 
world, and found ourselves here in bodies which 
are only a kind of walking matrix, in which the 
higher life is being developed. Separated from 
our maternal life, there is another umbilicus, the 
air, that seems to bind us to the great life we are 
now living. We enter upon this wider and higher 
life by breathing ; we hold it by breathing ; and we 
live in this walking matrix, receiving strength from 
our vaster mother, Nature, and we seem to develop 
until it is severed, and we are born up into a higher 
life. So it looks to me as I contemplate this 
strange mystery of life. It seems to me that when 

139 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

this life goes out, we are born into some condition 
of being that is higher. If we take this view of the 
subject, it relieves what we call dying of much of 
the unnecessary darkness and gloom that has been 
thrown around it. It reminds me of a beautiful 
allegory I have somewhere read. It is related 
that a tree heard one of its leaves crying, and 
coming to the leaf asked it what it was crying 
about. And the leaf said that the wind had told 
it that the time would come when it must be blown 
away. Then the tree told the branch and the 
branch told the leaf to dry its tears ; it should not 
die, but should continue to sport itself in the sum- 
mer breeze and the summer sunshine. But after a 
while the leaf saw a silent change coming over its 
fellow leaves. They gradually put off their modest 
green and were decked in hues of purple and gold. 
It looked upon this dress of beauty, and upon its 
own familiar green, and it began to cry again. 
And the branch told the tree that the leaf was cry- 
ing, and the tree came again to see about what the 
leaf was crying. And the leaf said : ' ' The other 
leaves are dressed in garments of beauty, while I 
keep on my old garment of green, and I cry." 
Then the tree told the leaf that this change of 
dress would be put off to-morrow, and that it 
might now, if it wished, put on these garments. 

140 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

And thus the leaf was permitted to put on the 
golden hues. And the winds of autumn came and 
it was soon borne away. 

So, my friends, much as we dread the autumn 
and the winter of death, we might as well weep if 
we had forever to stay down in these lower worlds, 
in these feeble bodily conditions, when the worlds 
of beauty roll on forever in immensity, and souls 
are rising and casting off their garments of dust, 
and passing away. Let us rather rejoice that, 
having had a birth that brought us into this state, 
and a development as far as possible, we may wel- 
come the approach of the hosts of joy, dressed in 
garments woven by angel fingers; welcome the 
lines that time brings about our eye ; welcome the 
weight of years that begins to press us down ; wel- 
come the weakness of age, the decay of strength, 
the dimness of sight, the dulness of hearing; and 
even let the cold winds of winter and the hot suns 
of summer hasten the process. For it is only the 
wearing out of the body, the putting on of gar- 
ments for the evening, the getting ready for the 
morning ; and then will come the whisper bye and 
bye, "You have traveled long enough, you have 
toiled long enough; now lay down the burden, 
gather up your feet and go to the vaster realm 
above and beyond. ' ' 

141 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
Atheism No Argument Against Immortality 

By William Trail 
Even on the supposition that there is no God, 
does it follow that man cannot by possibility sur- 
vive the stroke of death? We think not. For the 
power, whatever it may be, which has introduced 
man on this present scene, endowed with a cor- 
poreal life, may also, for anything the atheist can 
show, introduce man on a future scene with a life 
incorporeal. Be that power what it may — even 
admit that it is fate, or chance, or natural law, or 
some nameless energy which has kindled within 
our bodies the vital spark, — how can the atheist be 
sure whether this same power, this fate or chance, 
or law or energy, may not prolong that spark, or 
even make it burst into a flame, by the very same 
stroke which is to shiver the present external 
covering? Till the atheist, then, has discovered 
what this hidden power is, which he says has pro- 
duced human life here, and shall have proved that 
this power could not by possibility prolong that 
life hereafter, he is plainly not entitled to pro- 
nounce another world to be impossible. He labors 
hard, and may perhaps succeed, in extinguishing 
all hopes or even all fears of a hereafter, in that 
abysmal darkness where he loses sight of God. 
But what then? Does his ceasing to hope for, or 

142 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

dread it, make it an impossibility? In that dark- 
ness there is some power. We say it is God, let 
the atheist call it what he will ; but there is some 
power even in that abyss of darkness, which with- 
out the atheist being able to prevent it, has sent 
him into this world of sorrows and of tears, a 
creature to suffer and to weep, to be born, and 
how knows he that it is to stop here I "Were he to 
entreat it to annihilate him at death, can he tell 
whether it will hear him ? Or if it heard him, that 
it can do what he asks of it? 

Even on the atheist's supposition, then, there is 
not a God, it would be rash to pronounce another 
world to be impossible. 

# * # 

The Soul's Claim 

By Seneca 

The soul of man is great and generous, admitting 
no other bounds to be set to her than what are com- 
mon with God. She claims for her country the 
universe, the whole convex wherein are included 
the lands and the seas, wherein the air, expending 
itself between the earth and the heavens conjoins 
them both. Nor does she suffer herself to be con- 
fined to any number of years. All years, says she, 
are mine. No age is locked up from the penetra- 

143 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

tion of learned men — no time so distant or dark 
that it is not previous to thought. 

When the day shall come that will separate this 
composition, human and divine, I will leave this 
body here where I found it, and return to the gods. 
Not that I am altogether absent from them now, 
though detained from superior happiness by this 
heavy earthly clog. This short stay in mortal life 
is but the prelude to a better and more lasting life 
above. 

Look, then, with an intrepid eye upon that deter- 
mined happy hour. It is not the last to the soul, if 
it be to the body. Whatever things are spread 
around thee, look upon them only as the furniture 
of an inn. We must leave them and go on. Nature 
throws us out of the world as she threw us into it. 
We must carry nothing away with us, as we 
brought with us nothing into it. Nay, even a 
great part of that which attended us when we came 
into the world must be thrown ofT. The skin which 
nature threw over us as a veil must be stripped 
off; our flesh, our blood that so wonderfully cir- 
culates through every part of it must be dispersed, 
as also the solids, the bones and nerves which sup- 
ported the fluids and weaker parts. That day, 
which men are apt to dread as their last, is but a 
birthday of an eternity. 

144 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

You will then say yon lived in darkness before 
when yon shall behold the fnll glories of that light 
which now thon seest dimly through the narrow 
circles of the eyes, and yet at so great a distance 
as to fill the mind with admiration and astonish- 
ment. How, then, will it amaze yon when I say 
you shall behold that divine light in its full spread 
of glory in heaven ! Such a reflection as this can- 
not but raise the mind above every mean thought, 
and deter us from every vile and cruel practice. 
It informs us the gods are witnesses of all our 
actions ; it commands us to make ourselves accept- 
able to them, to prepare ourselves for communion 
with them, and have always eternity in view which 
whoever hath any conception of he dreads no 
enemies; he hears the trumpet's sound undis- 
mayed, nor can all the threats in the world terrify 
his manly soul ; for why should he be afraid of any- 
thing? 

* * # 

Forms Change, Essences Remain 

By Bishop Eandolph S. Foster 

There is not a particle of ground for the imagi- 
nation that any animal, not even the simply animal 
part of man, is destined to immortality. But is 
not this in contradiction of what has been said? 
Not as we understand it. The thing posited is 

145 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

this: Essences or substances of being are per- 
manent, and so far as we can discern are destined 
to abide forever. Forms and compositions of 
things change and pass away, but their essences 
remain. The change of form is not obliteration of 
the substance. An animal is but a form of matter 
peculiarly endowed — a living form. The life 
which animates it is but a mode of creative activ- 
ity; its apparent intelligence is purely automatic 
and not personal ; a form of impulse from without. 
There is contained in the animal no subject of 
which these impulses and attributes can be pre- 
dicted. When the animal dies there is no evidence 
that any particle of being has been obliterated. 
The form has disappeared, but the substance which 
composed it has taken another form or entered 
into some new complex. The life-force and its 
cluster of automatic activities, instinctive im- 
pulses, has been withdrawn; but the being which 
inspired or posited them, and in whom also they 
had ground, is God, who abides forever. Thus it 
does not appear that in any varying forms which 
come upon the scene and vanish away, there is any 
more obliteration of being than there is in the cur- 
sory and vanishing combination of the kaleido- 
scope ; nor any more loss of essence than there is 
when the steam-engine is taken to pieces. The 

146 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

power which moved it is not annihilated, nor are its 
elements. Simply a change has occurred in the rela- 
tion of the parts. But it is said, would not these 
same facts apply to man, and prove that his case 
differs nothing from that of the animal ! If death 
change his form as it does that of the animal, and 
he disappears as really as the animal, wherein is 
the difference? How is it that we must conceive 
that he still exists and the animal does not? We 
have admitted that to mere sense the cases seem 
precisely alike. But are they? They are to a 
certain extent similar, and to the same extent the 
result of death is similar. But we have shown 
that man is a spirit. This the animal is not. So 
far forth as man is a form he vanishes and disap- 
pears not to return; so far forth as his was an 
automatic life, the force which played in it and con- 
stituted it is withdrawn, but so far forth as he is a 
spirit the destruction of the form and the with- 
drawment of the automatic life do not necessarily 
affect the integrity of that, and nothing short of 
annihilation can ; and that is ever resorted to there 
is no proof. In every other case decomposition is 
all that is manifest. We see no reason to suppose 
anything more in this case. But decomposition 
does not impair essence ; and decomposition is only 
possible where there is a complex. The spirit is 

147 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

not a complex, but a simple. No agent can take its 
parts asunder, for it has no parts; nothing can 
change its form, for it is formless as thought, or 
feeling, or volition, though it may always dwell 
in a form. No instrument is keen enough of edge 
to divide it, no lens has power enough to reveal it. 
The only effect death can have on it is to take down 
its house, and spoil the instrument by which now 
it shows that it is, and where it is. Whether it 
goes into another house and acquires a better 
instrument, is the question we are considering. 
What we claim is, that so far as any facts, exist- 
ence is guarantee of permanence, and so the spirit, 
we may believe, survives death — is immortal. 

# # # 

The Unity of Consciousness 

By Joseph Cook 

Here is an organ, and let us suppose that before 
its ivory keys there sits a musician who has what 
we may call Gyge's ring, which made the wearer 
invisible. Now at our organ there is a musician, 
but we cannot see him. We come to the edge of 
the key-board, and notice that the ivory is in 
motion. We further study the movements of the 
keys, and we find that there is a perfect harmony 
between the rising and falling of the ivory and the 

148 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

rising and falling of the melody. There stands a 
materialist on that side of the organ, and yon stand 
here, and yonr materialist says, "I have fonnd ont 
the canse of the music; notice every time the 
anthem rises and falls there is a perfect parallel- 
ism between the motions of these keys and the 
motion of the melody. ' ' But yon say, ' ' Parallelism 
is not identity,' ' and yet he sees these keys in 
motion, and mnsic falls from the organ. Why not 
say the ivory in motion is the canse of the mnsic? 
" Yon mnst distinguish, ' ' yon reply, "between par- 
allelism and identity. Ivory is inert and cannot 
move of itself.' ' "Well," says the materialist or 
Mr. Tyndall, "let ns have a new definition of ivory, 
let us put into ivory the potency of all music. 
Plainly, there must be a cause here, and now, as we 
can see only the ivory, let us say that ivory is to be 
correctly defined as the mysterious somewhat by 
which all this music is produced." That is the 
definition from the most brilliant man of science. 
When Tyndall is asked to give a definition of mat- 
ter, he defines it in this way. He puts into matter 
the promise and potency of all life. He puts into 
the keys what he wants to get out of them ; he puts 
into "matter," "mind," and that is not matter. 
We stand here before the organ and converse with 
each other, and having no partisan motives, we de- 

149 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

sire to obtain clear ideas. Farraday said inert- 
ness is the only character of matter. When mat- 
ter is in motion it will stop motion of itself; and 
when matter is at rest it will never start into 
motion — something must touch it from without ; in 
short, we must define inertia as capable of origina- 
ting force. What do I mean by force? Force is 
what is expended in producing or resisting motion. 
It cannot originate force or motion; and we say 
to Mr. Tyndall that we have a definition of it for 
two thousand years, and why should we change it? 
Suppose we try to speak of mind in the terms 
we speak of matter. When Columbus first saw the 
New World was his joy triangular or hexangular? 
If the imagination of an ordinary poet weighs an 
ounce, does Shakespeare's weigh a pound. Was 
the joy of Lincoln in signing the Emancipation Act 
brown or green? Is love red or green? We find 
when we make the attempts to use the terms we use 
in discussing matter to mind, there is no possibility 
of having the same substance at the same time, 
extension and no extension, coloring and no color- 
ing, weight and no weight. But there is no union, 
we are told, except close succession. We deny 
that succession is union. There must be a musi- 
cian at our keyboard. We can see him with the 
lens which is called axiom of sufficient reason. 

150 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

Where does the music come from? We have some 
forms of materialism that not only attempt to 
blow the music out of the bellows, but blow the 
musician out also. I do not deny that life stands 
behind a great number of chemical forces, I am not 
denying that there is a current under the boat, but 
I deny that the current lifts the sail or moves the 
oars. Heaven forbid that I should deny the quali- 
ties of the water and the boat ! But they do not 
explain its motion against the wind. So, these 
chemical forces that will reduce the matter of the 
body to dust, do not explain how it has been built 
from the dust and preserved from year to year, 
and its destructive forces have been curbed while 
life remains in the flesh. 

There is a great fact known to us more certainly 
than the existence of matter ; it is the unity of con- 
sciousness. I know that I exist, and that I am 
one. Hermann Lotze's supreme argument against 
materialism is the unity of consciousness. I know 
that I am I and not you ; I know this to my very 
finger tips. That finger is part of my organism, 
and not of yours. The unity of consciousness is 
a fact known to us by much better evidence than 
the existence of matter. I am a natural realist, if 
I may use a technical term : I believe in the exist- 
ence of both mind and matter. There are two 

151 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

things in the universe ; but I know the existence of 
mind better than I know the existence of matter. 
Sometimes in dreams we fall down precipices and 
awake, and find that the gnarled, savage rocks had 
no existence. But we touched them ; we felt them ; 
we were bruised by them. Who knows but that 
some day we may wake, and find that all matter is 
merely a dream? Even if we do that, it will yet 
remain true that I am I. There is more support 
for idealism than for materialism, but there is no 
sufficient support for either. If we are to rever- 
ence all, and not merely a fraction, if the list of 
axiomatic or self-evident truths, if we are not to 
play fast and loose with the intuitions which are 
the eternal tests of verity, we shall believe in the 
existence of both matter and mind. Hermann 
Lotze holds that the unity of consciousness is a 
fact absolutely incontrovertible and absolutely 
inexplicable on the theory that our bodies are 
woven by a complex of physical arrangements and 
physical forces, having no co-ordinating presiding 
power over them all. I know that there is a co- 
ordinating presiding power somewhere in me. I 
am I. I am one. Whence the sense of unity of 
consciousness, if we are made up, according to 
Spencer's idea, or Huxley's of infinitely multiplex 
molecular mechanisms ? 

152 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

We have the idea of a presiding power that 
makes each man one from top to toe. How do we 
get it? It must have a sufficient cause. To this 
hour no man has explained the unity of conscious- 
ness in consistency with the mechanical theory of 
life. 

•Jp *A* tP 

The Mystery of the Silence of Death 

By Henry Ward Beecher 

I love to think that what seems the mystery of 
the silence of death, which envelops so many that 
we loved on earth, is really not a mystery. Our 
friends are separated from us because they are 
lifted higher than our faculties can go. Our child 
dies. It is the last we see of him here. He is 
lifted so far above us that we cannot follow him. 
He was our child ; he was cradled in our arms ; he 
clambered upon our knees; but instantly, in the 
twinkling of an eye, God took him and lifted him 
up into his own sphere. We see him not. It is 
because we are not yet developed enough. We 
cannot see things spiritual with carnal eyes. But 
they who have walked with us here, who have gone 
beyond us, and whom we cannot see, are still ours. 
They are more ours than they ever were before. 
We cannot commune with them as we once could, 
because they are infinitely lifted above those con- 

153 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

ditions in which we are able to commune. We 
remain here, and are subject to the laws of this 
realm. They have gone where they speak a higher 
language, and live in a higher sphere. But this 
silence is not the silence of vacuity, and this mys- 
tery is not the mystery of darkness and death. 
Theirs is the glory; ours is the waiting for it. 
Theirs is the realization ; ours is the hoping for it. 
Theirs is the perfection; ours is the immaturity 
striving to be ripe. And when the day comes that 
we shall disappear from these earthly scenes, we 
shall be joined to them again, but not as we were — 
for we shall not then be as we were — but as they 
are, with God. We shall be like them and Him. 



Is Man a Failure? 

By George R. Wendling 

Nature succeeds in all her operations. Indi- 
vidual specimens may fall by the way, but the 
species accomplishes its end. Now unless man 
live again, he is an absolute failure. Go set your- 
self what theory you will concerning the object of 
man's creation, and if you exclude a life beyond 
the grave, man is a failure. Remember, however, 
that throughout all Nature every created object 
fitly serves some discoverable purpose, and is fully 

154 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

capable of performing its mission. .We know 
what the sheep in the pasture and the cattle on the 
hills are for; we know the uses of the fruits and 
the ripening grain; we can tell the purpose for 
which birds and fishes were made, and from the 
clouds yonder with their rain and thunderbolts, 
yea! from the sun, moon and stars behind the 
clouds, down through the infinite ether to the 
earth's crust, and down further yet to the great 
mines of gold and silver, to the great lakes of oil 
and salt, everywhere throughout every highway 
and bypath, and into every recess of Nature, 
may we trace a purpose, discern an object or 
recognize a mission for every created thing, and 
find each thing capable of performing that mission. 

But what is your mission? Whom or what do 
you serve? What was the purpose of your crea- 
tion? Where do you belong in the catalogue of 
the universe? What are you doing here on this 
planet ? For what are you designed ? Name any 
purpose you will for man, ascribe to him any mis- 
sion you will, assign to him any place you will in 
the economy of Nature, and if you do not include 
the possibilities of a future life, man is an abso- 
lute failure. 

Turn where you will, look up and down every 
avenue, view life in all its varying phases, and 

155 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

there can be but one solemn conclusion — if there 
is no life beyond the grave, man is an abject fail- 
ure. A failure! can that be! No! No! Man 
standing at the summit, the heir of all the ages, 
destined to ultimate dominion over all the earth, 
the master of steam and electricity, the autocrat of 
earth and sea, compelling even the stars to yield 
their secrets to his spectrum analysis ; man, walk- 
ing to and fro in the corridors of the universe, 
naming and weighing the planets, telling when and 
where the wandering comet shall appear ; man, en- 
dowed with such wonderful powers as these, and 
endowed too with a heart that can love and love 
forever — No ! The Almighty has not written the 
word failure on the forehead of such a being as 
that, and somehow and somewhere, man must and 
will push on and up in a career worthy of a crea- 
ture thus made in the sublime image of the Infinite 
One Himself. * * * 

The Divine Fatherhood and Immortality 

By Dr. Amoky Bradford 

The doctrine of Divine Fatherhood shows that 
God and man are of essentially the same nature. 
This does not mean that they are identically the 
same beings. Identity of nature does not imply 
identity of being. Every child is identical in nature 

156 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

with his father, and yet every child has an individ- 
uality peculiarly his own. The doctrine of the 
Fatherhood teaches that men and the Father who 
gave them being are partakers of the same nature. 
. . . If God and man have identically the same 
nature, then the inference is inevitable that man 
will live as long as God. The human body dies ; 
it is essential to the thought of God that he never 
dies. If God could die, there would be no God. 
If his children possess his being, they must also 
possess his immortality. Either the premise must 
be denied, or the conclusion must be accepted. 
Fatherhood necessitates the continuance of the 
relation between parent and child. If that rela- 
tion endures, then man must live, not in a dif- 
fused and impalpable immensity, but as the child 
of God ; not as a mere personal emanation which is 
at last to be absorbed into his infinity, but as an 
eternal person. Childhood means individuality, 
and individuality must continue as long as the rela- 
tion between the parent and the child continues. 
If God is the Everlasting Father, then man is his 
everlasting child. If man is the everlasting child 
of the Everlasting Father, then, throughout all the 
ages that are before him, he will possess the qual- 
ities of personality, which is all that distinguishes 
him as in the image of God. 

157 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
Something Behind the Veil 

By Professor Goldwin Smith 
There are phenomena in our nature which, 
apparently, are not physical, but seem to point to 
something beyond our physical existence. They 
constitute, in the aggregate, what we have called 
our spiritual life, including our sense of moral 
responsibility, our moral aspirations, our feeling 
for moral beauty, our power of idealization, our 
higher and more perfect human affections. Is 
there anything to which these point? May there 
not be something behind the veil ? 
• He sees that stopping the spring does not 
destroy the source of water, which flows just as 
merrily in some other direction. If he shuts the 
sunlight out of his room, it shines just as cheerfully 
in other places. He sees and hears of a something 
called electricity, with which man's ingenuity has 
vitalized inert machinery, so that to-day the 
machines are talking to him from every quarter of 
the globe. If he takes a club and demolishes one 
of these same telegraphic instruments while it is 
speaking, the voice instantly ceases and is heard 
no more. What has he done ? He has not annihi- 
lated electricity, nor crippled it, nor even incom- 
moded it. It is still at hand, pressing and mount- 
ing to the very lips that a moment ago gave it 

158 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

expression. If he should take the same club and 
demolish the brain and vocal apparatus of a 
fellow-man the effect would be very similar, so far 
as we humans can determine. The instrument, 
like the other one, would cease action because it 
was broken. Life leaves the human body when 
some physical lesion occurs that stops mechanical 
action ; but not before. Its exodus does not cause 
the lesion ; the lesion causes the exodus. The spirit 
does not depart until evicted. The house becomes 
untenantable, the mask destroyed, the bell un- 
tongued, the circuit broken, and the tenant flies — 
whither? The artist's mission is not ended when 
his brush or chisel is spoiled, nor the writer's when 
his pen is broken. 



# # 



A Philosophic Analogy 

By John Fiske 

You can measure heat, you can measure electric- 
ity, and since the action of nerves in all probability 
consists of undulatory motions it is to some extent 
measurable, and doubtless would be completely 
measurable had we the means. But when you 
come to thoughts and emotions, I beg to know how 
you are going to work to give an account of them in 
footpounds ! It is not simply that we have no 
means at hand, no calculus equal to the occasion, 

159 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

tlie thing is absurd on its face. It is as true to-day 
as it was in the time of Descartes that thought is 
devoid of extension and cannot be submitted to 
mechanical measurement. . . . The natural his- 
tory of the mass of activities that are perpet- 
ually being concentrated within our bodies, to be 
presently once more disintegrated and diffused, 
shows us a closed circle which is entirely physical, 
and in which one segment belongs to the nervous 
system. As for our conscious life, that forms no 
part of the closed circle, but stands entirely out- 
side of it, concentric with the segment which 
belongs to the nervous system. These conclusions 
are not at all in harmony with the materialistic 
view of the case. If consciousness is a product of 
molecular motion, it is a natural inference that it 
must lapse when the motion ceases. But if con- 
sciousness is a kind of existence which within our 
experience accompanies a certain phase of molecu- 
lar motion, then the case is entirely altered, and 
the possibility or probability of the continuance of 
the one without the other becomes a subject for 
further inquiry. Materialists sometimes declare 
that the relation of conscious intelligence to the 
brain is like that of music to the harp, and when 
the harp is broken there can be no more music. 
An opposite view, long familiar to us, is that the 

160 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

conscious soul is an emanation from the Divine In- 
telligence that shapes and sustains the world, and 
during its temporary imprisonment in material 
forms the brain is its instrument of expression. 
Thus the soul is not the music, but the harper; 
and obviously this view is in harmony with the 
conclusions which I have deduced from the correla- 
tion of forces. Upon these conclusions we cannot 
directly base an argument sustaining man's im- 
mortality, but we certainly remove the only serious 
objection that has ever been alleged against it. 
We leave the field clear for those general con- 
siderations of philosophic analogy and moral prob- 
ability which are all the guides upon which we can 
call for help in this arduous inquiry. 

# * # 

The Enterprises of the Intellect 

By Washington Gladden 

Repeat the question, "0 soul, of what stature 
art thou? What thinkest thou of thyself ?" and 
the answer will come again : "I am a denizen not 
only of the eternities, but of the infinities. Bound- 
less space, as well as endless duration, is the 
sphere of my powers. The other creatures are 
content with a limited habitat. If they migrate, 
it is in narrow belts of longitude, from colder to 

161 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

warmer climates : but I traverse the globe, I scale 
the mountains, I put a girdle around the earth, 
and this only to get a footing for my. great career. 
From this pedestal outreaching I plunge with my 
spectroscope into the heart of the sun ; I fly from 
planet to planet, from star to star, reading with 
my glass the pamplisest of the sky ; making myself 
at home in worlds that are billions of leagues 
away. ' ' 

What is the meaning of this magnificent quest, 
these enterprises of the intellect, that put the 
whole universe under contribution? Is it, that, 
like the traveler before a journey, man likes to 
study the country whither he is bound, and not 
be wholly without a key to its contents and laws ? 
If you found a plowboy taking lessons in naviga- 
tion and poring over maps of New Zealand and 
Fiji, you would guess that he was about to take to 
the sea and become a colonist at last; and if we 
have but to till our own earth for a season, what 
can be the fascination of sailing through the skies % 
Is it not that we have vaster relations than with 
our immediate surroundings? that the mind's 
estate is greater than we had conceived ? and that 
in these excursions we feel the outskirts of a prob- 
lem that is to engage larger meditation and 
maturer powers 1 

162 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 
Life With Immortal Hope 

By Daniel Makch 

No man can afford to live without a supreme all- 
controlling faith in the endless life to come. The 
things of earth and time are nearest, and just 
because they are so near they seem so great. The 
smallest coin that Mammon ever made, held close 
to the eye, will hide a sun a million times larger 
than the earth. And just because the petty coin is 
so near and the mighty sun is so far away. In the 
dark and dangerous hour of temptation, one short 
moment of that hour may hide the eternity that 
lies beyond. A pleasure, a trial, a provocation 
which comes and goes in a moment, may cause us 
to act as if our whole existence were only a 
transient bubble on the sea of time, blown into 
being by the passing breeze, and as soon blown 
away. This present world addresses us through 
every sense of the body and every faculty of the 
mind and every sensibility of the heart, and it 
would bind us here with bands of iron and walls 
of adamant. 

Nothing can save us from that bondage but faith 
in the immortal life to come. Children of earth, 
toiling, struggling, hoping, fearing, as you are, 
carry that faith with you everywhere, and make it 
your shield against all temptation to live as if this 

163 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

were your only home. In the street and in the 
market place, in the transactions of trade and in 
the intercourse of society, in the weary tasks of 
labor and in the quiet hours of rest, in the joyous 
days of hope and success, and in the dark days of 
failure and disappointment, keep this one thought 
near your conscience and near your heart : There 
is another and better life than this, and for that 
life I will hold myself in constant preparation. 
If the thrones and crowns of all the earth were 
mine, I should use them best by making them 
stepping-stones on which to climb the heavenly 
heights. 

When pleasure sings with siren voice, when 
fashion flutters in silken robes, when Mammon 
tempts with golden store, when labor wearies with 
heavy burdens, when disappointment smites with 
stunning stroke, when sickness prostrates with 
secret wound, when death stands threatening at 
the door, still let faith in the blessed and endless 
life to come keep your heart pure and your hope 
strong. Let no earthly influence entice or terrify 
you into forgetfulness of your high and glorious 
destiny. Let no voices from the world ever pre- 
vent your singing with the understanding and the 
heart that oldest and newest song of our great im- 
mortality, "I know that my Eedeemer liveth?" 

164 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 
The Analogies of Nature 

By William Jennings Bkyan 
Christ gave us proof of immortality, and yet it 
would hardly seem necessary that one should rise 
from the dead to convince us that the grave is not 
the end. 

If the Father deigns to touch with divine power 
the cold and pulseless heart of the buried acorn 
and to make it burst forth into a new life, will he 
leave neglected in the earth the soul of man, made 
in the image of his Creator? If He stoops to give 
to the rosebush whose withered blossoms float 
upon the autumn breeze, the sweet assurance of 
another springtime, will he refuse the words of 
hope to the sons of men when the frosts of winter 
come? If matter, mute and inanimate, though 
changed by the forces of nature into a multitude 
of forms, can never die, will the spirit of man 
suffer annihilation when it has paid a brief visit 
like a royal guest to this tenement of clay? No, I 
am as sure that there is another life as I am that 
I live to-day! I am sure that, as the grain of 
wheat contains within an invisible germ which can 
discard its body and build a new one from earth 
and air, so this body contains a soul which can 
clothe itself anew when this poor frame crumbles 
into dust. 

165 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

A belief in immortality not only consoles the 
individual, but it exerts a powerful influence in 
bringing peace between individuals. If one really 
thinks that man dies as the brute dies, he may 
yield to the temptation to do injustice to his neigh- 
bor when the circumstances are such as to promise 
security from detection. But if one really expects 
to meet again, and live eternally with those whom 
he knows to-day, he is restrained from evil deeds 
by the fear of endless remorse. We do not know 
what rewards are in store for us, or what punish- 
ments may be reserved, but if there were no 
other punishment it would be enough for one 
who deliberately and consciously wrongs another 
to have to live forever in the company of the 
person wronged and have his littleness and self- 
ishness laid bare. I repeat, a belief in immor- 
tality must exert a very powerful influence in 
establishing justice between men and thus in lay- 
ing the foundation for peace. 



There is a Life Eternal 

By Pkof. Haknack 

Christ's grave was the birthplace of an inde- 
structible belief that death is vanquished and there 
is life eternal. It is useless to cite Plato; it is 

166 



A SYMPOSIUM ON IMMORTALITY 

useless to point to the Persian religion and the 
ideas and literature of later Judaism. All that 
would have perished; but the certainty of the 
resurrection and of a life eternal which is bound 
up with the grave in Joseph's garden has not per- 
ished; and on the conviction that Jesus lives we 
still base those hopes of citizenship in an Eternal 
City which make our earthly life worth living and 
tolerable. "He delivered them who, through fear 
of death, were all their lifetime subject to bond- 
age,' ' as the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrew 
confesses. That is the point ; and although there 
be exceptions to its sway, wherever, despite all the 
weight of nature, there is a strong faith in the 
infinite value of the soul ; wherever death has lost 
its terrors ; wherever the sufferings of the present 
are measured against a future of glory, this feel- 
ing of life is bound up with conviction that Jesus 
Christ has passed through death, that God has 
awakened him and raised him to life and glory. 
It is not by any speculative ideas of philosophy, 
but by the vision of Jesus' life and death and by 
the feeling of his imperishable union with God that 
mankind, so far as it believes in these things, has 
attained to that certainty of eternal life for which 
it was meant, and which it dimly discerns — eternal 
life in time and beyond time. 

167 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
Man Greater Than His Concept 

By William Potts George 
From whatever source it comes, whether it is a 
subject of direct divine revelation, or merely a 
conception of the human mind one fact is incon- 
trovertible : the idea of Immortality exists and is 
an essential component part of man's mental 
equipment. It is a great motive power, if not the 
greatest motive power, of universal humanity. It 
exerts its tremendous force in all ages, climes and 
conditions. It influences the actions of the savage, 
and serves to mould the characters of the highest 
intellects. It has spoken in the earliest ages, and 
continues to speak in this our latest century. 
Man's belief in God and Immortality are the most 
precious possessions of the human race. "If 
in this life only," said St. Paul, "we have hope in 
Christ, we are of all men most miserable (or 
pitiable.") Dean Stanley said that all the essen- 
tials of all the religions of the race can, in their 
final analysis, be resolved into these two beliefs in 
God and Immortality. Say that Immortality is 
merely a conception of the human mind. The con- 
ception is here, and as the conceiver is always 
greater than his concept, it follows as an inevitable 
conclusion that the mind which could conceive of 
Immortality must be itself Immortal. 

168 



The Soul Between Death and Resurrection 



I weary of this endless strife; 

I weary of this dying life, 

This living death, this dying chain, 

This torment of delay, 
In which her sins my soul detain 
Ah, when shall it be mine? — ah, when! — 

With my last breath to say, 
"No more I weep, no more I sigh!" 
I'm dying of desire to die. 

— St. Teresa of Spain. 



How blest the righteous when he dies! 

When sinks a weary soul to rest, 
How mildly beam the closing eyes, 

How gently heaves the expiring breath! 

So fades a summer cloud away; 

So sinks the gale when storms are o'er; 
So gently shuts the eye of day; 

So dies the wave along the shore. 

A holy quiet reigns around, 

A calm which life nor death destroys: 

Nothing disturbs that peace profound, 
Which his unfettered soul enjoys. 

Farewell, conflicting hopes and fears, 
Where lights and shades alternate dwell; 

How bright the unchanging morn appears ! 
Farewell, inconstant world, farewell ! 

Life's labor done, as sinks the clay, 

Light from its load the spirit flies; 
While heaven and earth combine to say, 

How blest the righteous when he dies ! 

— Mrs. Barbaidd. 



CHAPTER VI 
The Soul Between Death and Resurrection 

Feom the words "And Jesus said unto him, 
verily I say unto Thee, to-day thou shalt be with 
me in Paradise" (Luke 23: 43), confirmed by 
other Scriptural expressions we may be strength- 
ened in the belief that the souls of men do not in 
the period which intervenes between their separa- 
tion from the body and the general resurrection, 
sink into a condition of dull and lifeless torpor, 
but that they are conveyed to some abode, where 
they still retain their active powers, and are still 
alive to feelings and affections ; where, probably, 
portions of joy or suffering are assigned to them, 
such as are suited to the degrees of purity, holi- 
ness, and perfection, or of sinfulness and corrup- 
tion, in which they have quitted their earthly tene- 
ments ; until, at the last, at the great consumma- 
tion of all things, the day of final retribution, the 
dead will again rise into life, and every son and 
daughter of man will receive, by a solemn sentence, 
a doom of happiness or misery. 

Of the two malefactors crucified with our 
173 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

blessed Lord, one, impelled by depravity the most 
hardened, railed at Him as He hung exposed to 
the same common fate; the other, however, 
endowed with eorrecter feelings, passed on his 
reprobate fellow-sufferer a just and expressive 
rebuke: "Dost thou not fear God, seeing thou 
art in the same condemnation: and we indeed 
justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds ; 
but this man hath done nothing amiss.' ' He thus 
made that outward acknowledgment of the justice 
of his own condemnation, which flowed from sin- 
cere contrition and showed a feeling of that harsh 
injustice under which Jesus was doomed to suffer. 

But he went further than this. He showed him- 
self a believer in Jesus as the true Messiah, the 
Saviour of the world: "Lord remember me 
when thou comest into thy kingdom.' ' 

It is not to be supposed that he possessed any 
correct notion of the spiritual kingdom of the 
Messiah. He probably attached to the kingdom 
of Christ the gross notions of which even the most 
enlightened and most favored of His disciples 
appear at this time not to have divested their 
minds, namely, that the kingdom of the Messiah 
was to be a temporal kingdom, and that He was to 
appear at some future time arrayed in the glory 
and the majesty of an earthly prince. 

174 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

In one respect this malefactor may be said to 
have surpassed the apostles themselves, in this, 
that whereas they saw, in the approaching death 
of their Master, the extinction of all their hopes, 
he conceived and expressed a lively hope in Him, 
in those very circumstances which induced others 
to despair. For we have the fullest possible proof 
from the words before us, that he beheld in our 
Lord, not merely an innocent person expiring by 
a cruel death under an unjust accusation, but that 
he looked to Him as one who was to overcome the 
power of death, and to fulfil the promises which He 
had made to His disciples ; he acknowledged Him 
even under His present suffering state, as the true 
Messiah, as the one whom the voice of prophecy 
had long foretold, whom the eyes of all devout per- 
sons had ardently desired to see, and in whom 
were to be blessed all the families of the earth. 

Paradise is supposed to be originally of Persian 
derivation, passing by several commutations and 
changes into the Hebrew and Greek languages. 
If we accept its first origin, it undoubtedly implies 
a sort of pleasure-ground or garden laid out by 
art and adorned by shrubs and flowers. In its 
transmutation into the Greek, the latest language 
in which the word occurs, before its adaptation 
into our own, we find that it has several significa- 

175 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

tions, such as an abode of rest, a place where sor- 
row is unknown, where joy is the dominant note, 
and all are happy and contented in the essence 
of being. 

If we go beyond the Greek and interpret it in the 
Hebrew we shall find that it conveys the idea of 
pleasure, a place where all will be free to pursue 
their inclinations without restraint and enjoy an 
everlasting felicity in the belief of everything 
being done in accordance with a heavenly design. 
As a Hebrew word it is found only three times in 
the Scriptures, viz., in the books of Nehemiah, 
Ecclesiastes and the Song of Solomon. 

From the original sense, of a pleasure garden, 
it came to be applied in a figurative way, to signify 
a place of happiness and enjoyment into which the 
departed on earth could come to reap the reward 
for their good works here below. 

There is no intermediate place, but an inter- 
mediate state. The full Apocalypse of God is not 
given. The ransomed are round about the throne — 
living, personal, active but in a disembodied state, 
disembodied and therefore intermediate. 

Both literally and figuratively Paradise was 
taken in the sense of pleasurable sensation and 
enjoyment, but it must not be confounded in this 
acceptance with the heaven of perfect enjoyment 

176 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

and progress, the final destination of the true and 
faithful servants of God after the day of universal 
judgment when the spirit shall be united with its 
kindred clay. 

"To-day" — not at a distant period — imme- 
diately, on the very day when He came into His 
kingdom — He would confer on him the signal 
proof of His favor, in conveying him to Paradise. 
The meaning is clear as to place, the time is fixed, 
and the promise is enjoyment of a foretaste of that 
happiness which was afterwards consummated. 

Jesus as a Jew, according to the flesh, seems to 
have believed in the opinion prevailing among the 
Jews, that while the souls of the good entered into 
this Paradise immediately on their departure from 
earth, those of the wicked were at first con- 
veyed into a sort of purgatory, in which every 
portion of vice and evil was to be destroyed, 
every stain of corruption and imperfection to 
be cleared off, before their admission into a state 
of happiness. 

Prayers for the dead were at the time of our 
Lord's ministry offered in every synagogue — just 
as they are to this day. Sacrifices were offered 
in the temple for those who had departed in an 
imperfect state of preparation, and not one word 
of protest is recorded as uttered by our Lord 

177 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

against their practice or in the belief which it 
implied.* 

In this intermediate state of soul-existence, it is 
but logical to infer that a distinction is made 
between the condition of the good and the bad. 

It was in special recompense for a peculiar act 
of faith that the soul of the repentant malefactor 
was to be conveyed to Paradise. It is but right to 
assume that the impenitent soul was conveyed into 
a state of misery and doubtful anticipation. 

Whatever may be the nature of the soul- 
existence in the intermediate state and the wait- 
ing for the final destiny, it were idle philosophy to 
speculate upon. Without bodies, but not without 
heaven — a bodiless state and therefore coming 

*The first traces of the practice of prayers for the dead 
began in the Christian Church about two hundred years after 
Christ. But there was no purgatory. It was never received into 
the Greek Church, and according to the historian, Otho, of the 
twelfth century, it was but partially received in the Latin 
Church in his day. Hildebrand was the first of the Popes to 
introduce it. It was enacted into a dogma by the Council of 
Florence and sanctioned by Pope Eugenius in 1438. 

The one passage generally adduced to support purgatory is 
I. Peter 3: 19; "By which also he went and preached to the 
spirits in prison, which were sometime disobedient, when 
once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah," 
etc., and the only meaning of this text is that Christ once 
preached or caused a divine message to be borne to the 
spirits then in prison, to wit, in the days of Noah. There is 
not the slightest intimation that their condition can be affected 
either by our prayers or our purses. 

"By one offering hath he perfected forever them that are 
sanctified." "By his own blood he entered in once to the holy 
place having obtained eternal redemption for us." "Now 
where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin." 

178 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

between the present earthly state where the souls 
are clothed with the natural body, and the future 
resurrection state where the souls are clothed with 
the spiritual body. 

Doubtless the soul is exercising many of the 
better affections, many of the purer sympathies 
of its former state and all the while feasting on the 
happy foretaste of those more perfect joys, which 
at the great day of resurrection will finally be 
assigned to it. When the ransomed souls shall 
take their bodies back again, from corruption to 
incorruption, from the mortal to immortality, 
then, the grave robbed of its spoils, shall be fully 
brought to pass the saying that is written, "Death 
is swallowed up in victory.' ' 

The parable of Dives and Lazarus can scarcely 
fail of leading us to the same conclusion. "We can 
readily infer from it a good general description of 
that which will take place after death. From its 
interpretation we are to conclude that the souls of 
both the good and the bad, the virtuous and the 
sinful, are carried immediately after death to 
abodes suited to their respective qualities and 
natures, and that their conceptions and powers 
still remain in a state of activity. The soul of 
Lazarus we are told was carried "into Abraham's 
bosom.' '_ This is a figurative expression for a 

179 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

state of happiness. With Abraham the Jews 
associated the highest glory conceivable, so that 
when it is stated that the spirit of the poor man 
entered "into Abraham's bosom" we must accept 
the meaning as describing a lofty place in the 
celestial home. 

It was different with the soul of Dives. His 
spirit was condemned to a place of torment com- 
mensurate with the pleasures and the gluttonies 
he had indulged during the earthly existence. 

In the case of both it is plainly represented that 
they feel the difference of their conditions, retain 
the affections which they possessed when united to 
the flesh, and know what is passing amongst their 
former earthly connections. 

There can be no misconception whatever in 
regard to the time of the translation of the souls of 
Dives and Lazarus. It took place immediately 
after death. There was no annihilation, no time 
of waiting, no state of unconscious torpor or for- 
getfulness. At once the spirits of both went into a 
state of conscious activity where they fully real- 
ized what they had done while animating their 
bodies. The rich man speaks of his brethren as 
still living on earth and engaged in the very same 
sinful courses which had brought himself to his 
post-mortal state of misery and wretchedness. 

180 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

If we are to put any faith at all in this Scriptural 
revelation, we must be constrained to conclude that 
the soul after death does not pass into a state of 
either unconsciousness of subliminal passiveness, 
but is vitally keen to its surroundings, and anx- 
iously awaiting the future to join its composite, 
the body, on the day of the resurrection. 

If the soul remained as dead as the body in the 
interval between death and the resurrection, 
surely Christ would not represent it otherwise, as 
being in a state of activity and waiting. 

A passage taken from the writings of St. Paul 
is here appropriate and important as bearing tes- 
timony to the active existence of the soul after the 
mortal separation. The great apostle declares his 
willingness to be "absent from the body and pres- 
ent with the Lord. ' ' Here he is sighing for com- 
munion with his Redeemer, expressing a resigna- 
tion of spirit to the stroke of death as it would free 
him to come into the company of the Eternal. 
But the words "to be present with the Lord" 
could convey no meaning if the soul on its separa- 
tion from the body was to fall into a state of torpor 
or oblivion, a deadness to all feeling whether of 
sorrow or of joy. When, therefore, we find this 
chosen apostle expressing his firm conviction that 
in his own case, to be absent from the body would 

181 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

be to enjoy the presence of his Lord and Saviour 
we have his authority for the belief that the souls 
of good men will enjoy that same presence when 
they become ' ' absent from the body. ' ' 

There are many more texts and allusions in the 
Sacred Book to bear out, and indeed conclusively 
make us certain that the soul, when it is separated 
from its earthly tenement of clay, does not go down 
into the chambers of f orgetfulness, to be quiescent 
till called forth again to join the glorified clay, but 
is in a condition of actual being and consciousness, 
knowing its own place until the spirit made perfect 
there, all the exceeding glory shall come to the 
sons of God. 

St. John in the Apocalypse also comes forward 
with a conclusive testimony when he speaks of the 
vision of "the souls of them that were slain" as 
crying to the Lord "with a loud voice." 

In fact there is an accumulation of Scriptural 
authority for confirming us in the opinion that the 
soul does not exist in a state of torpor and insensi- 
bility during the period intervening between death 
and the resurrection. Only one argument, which, 
however, when put to the test of logical reasoning 
falls to the ground, can be produced in substantia- 
tion of the claim that when the body dies the soul 
also vanishes into the passiveness of forgetfulness, 

182 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 
and that is wherein the Scriptures speak of death 
as a continual ' ' sleep ' ' and the resurrection as an 
"awakening from this sleep." We read "many 
that sleep in the dust shall awake," and again 
reference is made to "the bodies of the saints 
which slept. ' * 

The season, the time of sleep, is an entity of 
rest, in which the exercise of all the faculties of 
the body and soul are for a time suspended. As 
the state of death is to the outward eye and the 
inner senses one of repose in which a more com- 
plete suspension of the living powers takes place, 
the analogy between death and sleep is obvious to 
every mind. 

Sleep is considered to be a temporary death, and 
death is long continued sleep. Hence among all 
peoples from the beginning the term sleep has 
been metaphorically used for death. But such a 
term is merely figurative, and symbolical of the 
suspension of the bodily functions and in this sense 
only are we to take it in the Scriptures. 

In a similar way the term ' ' awakening' ' so often 
used can be explained, save when applied to the 
resurrection. Then it is to be understood as the 
awakening from the repose of death to a state of 
new life and action. 

All Scripture tells us that at the day of resur- 
183 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

rection the scattered remnants of the body will 
be brought together and clothed with new glories, 
the corruptible will become incorruptible, the 
mortal assume immortality. 

In the everlasting life every soul will be united 
to its kindred body both to exist forever as one. 
The bodies of all will arise to meet the souls that 
animated them on earth and join them in the new 
and fuller being of eternity. 

Independent of the direct light, afforded by the 
sacred writings, regarding the state of the soul 
between death and the resurrection, the natural 
and spontaneous anticipations of our minds con- 
firm the idea that there is conscious existence. We 
consciously realize that death does not constitute 
the obliteration of all being, but that it is a pass- 
ing beyond to the greater existence. Deep down 
in our being we feel that there will be no cessation, 
but rather a direct continuity, that death is but a 
bridge we have to cross to continue the endless 
march which life begins. 

Does not the strong desire of life which reigns 
within us all, afford something of an internal proof 
that we shall not pass into the torpor of merely 
inanimate clay? The idea of falling into so long a 
sleep as must prevail between the separation of 
the soul and body until re-united at the resur- 

184 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

rection is repugnant to our senses and we refuse 
to accept any such conclusion. 

Even if the belief in the soul's existence in a 
separate state with powers and perceptions more 
actively acute, was not attested by Scripture, the 
appeal of reason would confirm us in its accept- 
ance, and having accepted it we grow stronger and 
more hopeful, filled with delightful anticipations 
of what lies on the other side of the grave. It is 
a thought pregnant with joy and consolation and 
comfort to every faithful servant of the Master. 
It tends to quicken all those busy expectations 
with which the soul casts its views forward to the 
hereafter. It animates us with a glorious con- 
sciousness, strengthens our faith and stimulates 
our exertions with the prospect of immediate 
recompense following our departure from the 
earth. 

But more than all, it is calculated to soothe our 
regrets for those who are departed, to lessen our 
terror of encountering that awful hour when every 
tie of interest, love and affection here below must 
be severed. For of all the unavoidable sources of 
affliction and sorrow incident to our earthly condi- 
tion the most paramount is the parting with those 
to whom we have been united by the bonds of 
friendship and of love, whose interests are ours, 

185 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

and whose very being seems to be a part of our 
own. The regret is assuaged that we are only 
going on before for a little time, and that soon they 
will meet us in the larger and fuller life on the 
other side of the tomb. 

Where can be found a more availing lenitive 
for the sorrows of separation than the considera- 
tion that the change will be better for ourselves, 
and that those who remain will be comforted by 
the thought that they will soon join us in the 
hereafter? Death is robbed of its terrors, every 
sting is extracted, every pain dissolved. The 
virtuous and the good will be entering into a purer, 
higher, holier realm, a paradise of enjoyment 
where they will be soothed by pleasing recollec- 
tions of time well spent, where they will be filled 
with brightest hopes and become alive to every 
feeling and affection that exalts and comforts. 

On the other hand, if we should incline to the 
belief that death is the bridge beyond which 
activity ceases and torpor reigns, how miserable 
and comfortless should we feel! What gloomy 
thoughts would arise in us at the prospect of sink- 
ing into a lethargy of being dead, in truth, to 
everything, oblivious of all surroundings. 

Truly gratifying is the assurance that dissolu- 
tion does not mean the end, but the beginning of a 

186 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

fuller and larger life, where the soul passes on to 
present enjoyment and to future hope. Surely 
there is reason sufficient to rejoice and no cause 
whatever for sorrow. We shall not be dead to the 
friends we leave behind, but alive to their love in 
a better, riper condition of being, and we shall 
feast on the expectation of meeting them soon and 
welcoming them to the more perfect state. If the 
belief in the future is availing to lessen the grief 
of those we leave, still more must it tend to animate 
their virtues and stimulate their hopes, to wean 
them from all excessive attachments to the world, 
and to diminish all undue reluctance to the 
inevitable severance. 

Of course the soul of man will ever experience 
somewhat of awe at the thought of the approach 
of death. Such is only natural, but terror will 
fade to the vanishing point in the light of the faith 
which penetrates the vast beyond. That light 
will disperse all alarms and its genial beams will 
show the way to the golden gates of hope which 
open to the home of immortality, whose beauties 
no earthly eye can see, whose everlasting songs 
no mortal ear can comprehend. 

Death is the gate of life — and through its portals 
all must pass to enter into the promised land. 
But the journey is only commenced when the flesh 

187 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

is cast aside, and the full realization will not be 
reached until glorious and immortal the body 
arises from the dust on the last day to join the 
spirit and complete the human personality. This 
day is called the general judgment, (*) when all 
will be brought together to receive the deserts of 
their work here on earth. 

Is this day of general judgment inconsistent 
with the doctrine of consciousness of being be- 
tween death and the resurrection? By no means. 
A necessity for this judgment can be admitted 
without the slightest interference with the truth 
of this consciousness. 

It may be said that the ends of justice are con- 
served when individuals are treated in accordance 
with their merits and since this is done imme- 
diately after death, wherefore the necessity for 
further procedure? 

Justice as it respects private persons, consists 
in regulating their conduct by its dictates, as far 

*The word judgment has lost its root signification. The 
Greek is xrisis, of which our word "crisis" is a mere trans- 
literation, meaning the turning point. Its primary meaning 
is to separate, and determine, then in a judicial sense to be 
put on trial. The judgment that takes place at death is 
separation. "It is appointed unto all men once to die, but 
after this the judgment." There is a judgment, a "crisis" a 
turning point. When a man dies, separation is quick and 
eternal, but the secondary meaning is a judgment judicial, 
declarative — a last great day when public decision will be 
made and awards rendered. — Herrick Johnson. 

188 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 
as their transactions with friends, neighbors and 
mankind in general are concerned. If they uni- 
formly preserve inviolate the rights of others, all 
demands of justice are fulfilled. But the justice 
of a governor belongs to the public who claim that 
not only should he impartially execute the laws, 
but that he should exercise his power in such a 
manner as is most conducive to general interests 
and the general welfare. The rewards to which 
deserving individuals are entitled ought not to 
be conferred, nor the punishments which trans- 
gressors have incurred, to be inflicted in silence 
and secrecy, but both should be openly dispensed 
for the honor of the governor's character and the 
advantage which will redound to the community 
from the salutary influence of example. 

As God is the Governor of the world it is not 
sufficient that He be just in accordance with his 
own divine wisdom, but he must show himself to 
be just in the eyes of all onlookers. He must let 
one see how another is rewarded or punished, in 
degrees commensurate to their varied virtues or 
imperfections. 

The particular judgment, as it is called, which 
takes place immediately after death is known to 
God and the individual. "We cannot follow others 
into another world, so we here are ignorant of 

189 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

their fate. We see men of different characters 
pass on, bnt we cannot trace the flight of their 
souls into the unknown, nor hear the sentence pro- 
nounced on them from the tribunal, and if we 
attempt to surmise, our conjectures may be far 
indeed from the truth. 

Hence it follows as a resultant of both logic and 
reason that there is a necessity for a general judg- 
ment at which all the children of men must be 
present to exemplify God's justice and vindicate 
his wisdom, which will show that his government 
was impartial, will allay all doubts and prove to 
all created beings that he was right in all his ways 
and holy in all his works. 

It is expedient that at the winding up of the 
scheme, all its parts should be seen to be worthy of 
Him, by whom it was arranged and conducted. In 
this way those who have witnessed, with many dis- 
quieting thoughts, the inequalities and seeming 
irregularities of the present system, will have full 
evidence that there was never the slightest devia- 
tion from the principles of equity, and that the 
cause of perplexity was the delay of their full 
operation. They will see the good and the bad no 
longer mingled together and apparently treated 
alike, but divided into two classes, the one on the 
right hand and the other on the left of the Judge, 

190 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

distinguished as much at least by their respective 
sentences, as by the places which they occupy. 
Then will the secrets of all hearts be made plain. 
There can be no longer simulation, hypocrisy or 
deceit. The pharisee will not be able to shout to 
the multitude from the housetops, — "Behold how 
holy am I?" He will stand exposed in all the 
nakedness of his sinful character. The white 
sepulchre who went around in purple and fine 
linen at the expense of his poor and helpless vic- 
tims will shrink in affright when confronted with 
his enormities. The oppressor of the widow and 
the orphan, who built his gorgeous mansions with 
their blood and bone and cemented them with tears 
shall be also confronted with his iniquities. No 
more can he hide beneath the cloak of his ill-gotten 
wealth and laugh at the sufferings of those he has 
robbed and plundered. The sins of the sinner will 
be revealed in all their disgusting hideousness and 
the dread sentence shall go forth that will ever 
separate him from the ranks of the virtuous. 
What a day of days will be that great general 
judgment when a just God metes out to every 
one according to his works ! 

The Lord shall come, the earth shall quake, 
And mountains to their centre shake, 
The Lord shall come a dreadful form, 
In wreathes of cloud and robes of storm, 

191 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

On cherub wings and wings of wind 
Appointed Judge of all mankind. 
All withering from the vaults of night 
The stars shall pale their feeble light, 

In wild despair shall sinners call 
Rocks hide us! Mountains on us fall! 
But saints ascending from the tomb 
Shall joyful sing — The Lord is come. 

Can this be He who wont, to stray 
A pilgrim on the world's highway 
Oppressed by power and mocked by pride 
The Nazarene, — the Crucified? 

Yes, the Judge shall be the Nazarene, the Cruci- 
fied who walked the earth in poverty and suffer- 
ing neglected, despised and persecuted by men, 
but who gave Himself up to the ignominious death 
of Calvary that men eternally might live. 

He is still being contemned and persecuted by 
sinners in the infringement of his commandments 
and in the transgression of his laws. The tyrant 
and oppressor, the usurer, the robber of inno- 
cence are insulting Him now and trampling upon 
his rules, scorning him, defying him by their lives 
of wickedness and shame, never thinking of that 
dread day when surrounded by the majesty of 
heaven He shall come to judge them and pass the 
irrevocable sentence of eternity. 

The seeming inequalities of earth will then be 
balanced to an unerring nicety. They who have 
looked upon wrong and seen innocence crouching 
before power, goodness bleeding and dying in the 

192 



BETWEEN DEATH AND RESURRECTION 

street, guilt pampering itself on the spoils of 
oppression, pompous pride and haughty arro- 
gance overriding the weak and helpless and filling 
the world with woe, while all the time he that sat 
on the throne of the mighty in heaven said not a 
word, nor put forth a finger to stop the wrong- 
doing, and, so far as appeared, cared nothing about 
it, will now find that he was but waiting for the 
final day of last account, to judge with eternal jus- 
tice the souls of men and render to them according 
to their works. Then all will know that He was 
ever on the side of right and, from the beginning, 
the utter, uncompromising foe of wrong. There it 
will be made manifest, as elsewhere it could never 
have been, that God is both a God of justice 
and goodness, that while " mercy and truth go 
before his face, justice and judgment are the 
habitation of his throne. ' ' Psalm 89 : 14. 



Our Children in Heaven 



And the mother gave, in tears and pain, 

The flowers she most did love; 
She knew she would find them all again 

In the fields of light above. 

not in cruelty and wrath, 

The reaper came that day; 
'Twas an angel visited the green earth, 

And took the flowers away. 

— H. W. Longfellow. 



There Is no flock, however watched and tended, 

But one dead lamb is there; 
There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended, 

But has one vacant chair. 

The air is full of farewells to the dying, 

And mourning for the dead; 
The heart of Rachel, for her children crying, 

Will not be comforted! 

Let us be patient! these severe afflictions 

Not from the ground arise; 
And oftentimes celestial benedictions 

Assume this dark disguise. 

We see but dimly through the mists and vapors; 

Amid these earthly damps 
What seem to us but sad funereal tapers, 

May be heaven's distant lamps. 

There is no death! what seems so is transition: 

This life of mortal breath 
Is but the suburb of the life Elysian 

Whose portals we call death. 

She is not dead — the child of our affection — 

But gone into that school 
Where she no longer needs our poor protection, 

And Christ himself doth rule. 

In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion. 

By guardian angels led, 
Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, 

She lives, whom we call dead. 

r— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 



CHAPTER VII 
Our Children in Heaven 

"They are not dead but gone before," we 
pathetically say of the loved ones who have passed 
beyond the horizon of our vision, whose footsteps 
are hnshed on the corridors of time, and of whose 
voices nonght remains but cold words, once warm, 
on lips now stilled in the silence of death. 

We lovingly gaze after them into the vistas of 
the shadow land, but we cannot penetrate beyond 
the mystic veil that hangs between time and 
eternity. 

The dear ones have gone forward; they are on 
the other side of the curtain and only imagination 
can follow them into that great hereafter to which 
we ourselves are hastening. 

Faith whispers there will be a happy reunion, 
and hope inspires us with a calm confidence that 
again we shall meet and dwell forever in an eternal 
brotherhood where parting shall be no more, 
where the links of love shall be adamantinely 
welded never to be broken, where all shall pass 
down the seons of an endless eternity, happy and 

199 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

contented in the indissoluble bonds of a holy and 
perfected state of being, chanting the praises of 
him who called us forth from nothingness to the 
fulness and glory of a participation in his own 
divine essence, making us one with himself in the 
dignity of his majesty and the eternity of his 
existence. 

These twin stars of faith and hope light the way 
to the confines of the unknown. They never set 
on this side of the hills of time, and so bright is 
their effulgence, that we can catch their gleams 
shimmering in the misty vastness of the great 
beyond. 

And in their pale glow coming from the other 
side we feel we can see and recognize those who 
have left us within the boundary limit of time to 
await our summons to cross the great divide. 

And of all those who have gone before to none 
do our hearts go out in greater love and longing 
than to the little children, whose infant voices have 
been hushed on earth ere their treble notes could 
ascend to the mighty symphony of the music of 
maturer years. 

The echoes of their childish prattle ring through 
the chambers of memory and refuse to be deadened 
amid the sounds and turmoils of this busy, every- 
day life. 

200 



OUR CHILDREN IN HEAVEN 

We hear their footsteps pattering adown the 
aisles of remembrance, their little handclasps are 
still warm and we feel their soft breath upon our 
withered cheeks fanning anew into life the slug- 
gish currents of our heart and brain. 

From their memory we refuse to be divorced. 
Everything recalls to us their life and presence, 
and the influence they wielded over us while the 
breath of incipient being animated their frail 
tenements of clay. 

We fondly recall their words, their looks, their 
gestures, every little peculiarity of ways and 
actions until the flood-gates of sorrow for their 
departure can be no longer stemmed and we burst 
forth in unavailing anguish for their loss. 

We clasp to our breasts the inanimate playthings 
they have used as if they could impart to us some- 
what of the light of love ruthlessly extinguished 
before the flame could glow with the full beauty 
and glory of a rounded life. Every object asso- 
ciated with them becomes sacred to the touch, a 
shred of garment, a lock of hair, anything that con- 
jures up their beloved and lost presence, but noth- 
ing gives our bleeding hearts surcease from the 
mourning of their absence, and the only comfort 
offered us lies in the thought that again we shall 
clasp them to our breast, hear again their joyous 

201 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

prattle and, again bask in the sunshine of their 
infant smiles. 

Did we believe that their opening light had gone 
out forever in the darkness of oblivion, that the 
folded petals of their rosebuds would never reopen 
to the caresses of love, the thought would indeed 
be terrible and would plunge our souls into unut- 
terable anguish. 

Death truly would be unnatural were it to wipe 
out forever every trace of the little dimpled dar- 
lings whose rosy tendrils have twined around our 
hearts with such infinite love. But reason will not 
allow us to entertain such a gloomy and revolting 
theory. Such would not be in keeping with the 
designs, nor with the mercy and love of the good 
Father to whom we are all "as little children," 
looking to him for subsistence here and for reward 
in the heavenly hereafter. 

Our consolation is that death is not a final sever- 
ance, but only a parting for awhile, till the meet- 
ing takes place upon the farther shore. 

But why the parting so early, or as Shake- 
speare says, "Why should men perish in advance 
as if the sun should set ere noon?" 

It is reckoned that fully one-half of the race die 
before the age of ten years. Why should life end 
so soon for so great a number? Why are they 

202 



OUR CHILDREN IN HEAVEN 

sent into the world at all when their sojourn 
therein is to be of such short duration! Why are 
the rose-buds not allowed to come to full flower 
and exhale their fragrance amid their earthly 
surroundings ? 

These truly are hard questions to answer, and 
to give any kind of a solution we must fall back on 
the inscrutability of the ways of Providence. To 
us they are mysterious, and the mystery is not for 
mortal ken. We do not understand the law of 
being, just as we do not understand the law of 
death. Much is hidden from our finite knowledge 
which will not be revealed until our eyes open to 
the grand secret of God's eternal wisdom. 

Why the plant is cut down before it has time to 
bourgeon and blossom into the fruitage of matur- 
ity the naturalist is at a loss to know. He cannot 
understand it. It is beyond his researches into 
the intricacies of natural being. 

The philosopher as well as the theologian stands 
baffled in the face of death. They are both as 
powerless as the most ignorant to interpret its 
mystery, and only faith can enable them to come 
to any kind of conclusion. Without it all their 
hypotheses and theories are so much conjecture. 

The future estate of children who pass beyond 
the vale of time ere reaching the noonday maturity 

203 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

of years, has engrossed the attention of the most 
earnest investigators in the realm of metaphysics 
and applied theology. It has become a subject of 
deep anxiety to many, and of intense interest to all. 

Those bereft are ever craving light to show 
them whether the promising buds nipped by life's 
early frost will appear in full-bloom in a more 
congenial clime, or wither into the nothingness of 
non-existence. 

The only satisfactory information which can 
throw light upon the question or solve the myste- 
rious problem is obtained from the Bible, yet in 
face of this fact many erroneous views have been 
held and are still put forward, even by those sub- 
scribing to an explicit belief in the teachings of 
the sacred Scriptures. 

Some have asserted that infants at death cease 
to exist, in other words are annihilated out of 
being altogether. 

This view is as unreasonable as it is unscrip- 
tural, being at variance with the dictates of faith 
and the conceptions of a true religion. 

Every argument, drawn from nature, expe- 
rience, reason and revelation for the immortality 
of the soul utterly and absolutely fails and has 
neither force nor logic if infants cease to exist 
after the death of the material body. 

204 



OUR CHILDREN IN HEAVEN 

If Adam had breathed into his inanimate frame 
"the breath of life," whereby he became a "living 
soul," then every being sprung from his loins 
shares his nature and partakes of the immortality 
conferred upon him as the progenitor of the race. 

The Bible takes for granted that infants are 
invested with endless existence, that death is but a 
separation of parent and child for a short interval ; 
that the one will join the other and both dwell for- 
ever in each other's companionship; the child 
going back, after a short space, to the bosom of 
the Father as it came into the arms of the earthly 
parents. 

The little ones die in the Lord, gain rest without 
labor, victory without conquest and are saved 
without probation. 

The Bible representing little children as especial 
objects of divine interest, assures us they are 
immortal beings, and as such are spirits and a 
part of God's life, and, therefore, can never die. 

Jesus himself made children the especial objects 
of his care and the proteges of his love. He was 
ever solicitous for them and gathered them around 
him on all possible occasions. "Suffer little chil- 
dren to come unto Me," said he, "for of such is 
the Kingdom of Heaven," by which it is unmis- 
takably proven that the abode of the blessed is for 

205 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
those who conform to the Father's will and purify 
themselves free from stain as the little ones who 
know not sin. 

Throughout all its aspects Christianity takes 
especial interest in the children, and its Gospel 
tells us quite plainly that they pass into ineffable 
glory, at the same time imparting the consolations 
to sorrowing hearts, of the bright and beautiful 
hope of restoration in a heavenly re-union. 

In times past the gloomy theory was held by 
many that all who die unbaptized are eternally 
lost, a doctrine infinitely more execrable than that 
which believed in utter extinction for those who 
had not come through years to the use of reason, 
or in other words, the infants whom death claimed 
before reaching the knowledge of maturity. 

Infant baptism was regarded by many, and 
through ignorance is still regarded by some, as 
communicating regeneration to the soul, and con- 
sequently has led to a wide belief that it is neces- 
sary to salvation. 

Fortunately, however, Christians of all denom- 
inations are breaking away from such an extrava- 
gant and foolish error of belief. 

As the mists, which for ages have gathered 
around the ceremony of infant baptism, are being 
dispersed by the clear light of Gospel knowledge. 

206 



OUR CHILDREN IN HEAVEN 

and the Bible is being better studied and inter- 
preted, a truer view as to the salvation of infants 
is being taken by thinkers and theologians of every 
religious school. 

Now, happily, the great majority of Christians 
believe that baptism does not impart a new heart 
and is no longer essential as a passport to eternal 
salvation. 

The Bible teaches that a man, like Simon Magus, 
who was baptized, yet declared to be, ' ' in the gall 
of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity, " requires 
something more than immersion or the sprinkling 
of water to gain a place among the elect. 

Many baptized persons are infidels, nay, even 
worse — profligates, renegades to all religion and 
contemners of every belief. 

Baptism does not make an individual a Chris- 
tian any more than a mere formula of words 
makes an alien a subject of another power, loyal 
to its government and institutions. 

The penitent thief was not baptized, yet the 
Saviour said to him, "This day shalt thou be with 
me in Paradise," meaning thereby that his salva- 
tion was assured. 

The sins of Paul were forgiven him and he came 
into God's friendship and grace before he had 
been baptized. 

207 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Though parents may believe their children to 
be dedicated to God in baptism, no sane person 
should have ever believed that the neglect of such 
a ceremony would be visited on unconscious and 
irresponsible infants. 

It is now generally accepted by most evangelical 
churches that all infants without exception or 
limitation as to character of parents are saved. 

And it is safe to say that whatever different 
expressions of dogma and doctrine may be in some 
of the churches, that not alone Protestantism, but 
the most enlightened Roman Catholicism has come 
to a united belief that baptism is not essential to 
salvation, nor does it insure regeneration and, 
therefore, all infants are saved. 

As an heir to the fallen nature of humanity sin 
is in the child as fire is in the flint. 

But water will not wash away the defection. It 
takes something more, — something, the efficacy of 
which prevails with God to appease wrath and 
offended majesty on account of the transgressions 
against his laws by sin. This something is the 
atoning blood of Jesus, the Sacrifice of Calvary 
which avails unto salvation for every child before 
the years of responsibility. 

Christ met the full penalty of the law as incurred 
by man's transgression, and wrought a righteous- 

208 



OUR CHILDREN IN HEAVEN 

ness which stands over against Adam's sin so that 
where sin once abounded, grace now more abounds. 

This grace is assured to children without effort 
on their part, and without acceptance of Christ, 
inasmuch as they are incapable of faith or any 
conscious act. 

Children form the largest part of that multitude 
"whom no man can number.' ' God is forever 
stocking his heavenly gardens with these buds of 
promise taken from the nurseries of earth. 

The thought that the little ones who have passed 
on are in the loving Father's care is the sweetest 
comfort to the hearts of bereaved parents. How 
many fathers and mothers, grimed and blackened 
with the world's sin are led back to contemplation 
and repentance by the silken cords of childish love 
and are brought into unity again by faith in the 
heavenly hereafter where all shall dwell together 
in the joys of a happy eternity. 

The small voices call to hardened consciences 
and the most abandoned hearken to their sounds. 
Sorrow for their loss is turned into joy in the hope- 
ful expectation of the heavenly meeting. David 
comforted himself in the thought that while he 
could not bring back his child, he could go to him. 

It is not when your children are with you that 
they are most to you, not when they are playing 

209 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

around your feet and climbing your knees for 
your kisses and caresses, but it is when tliey are 
gone, and flood-gates of memory. burst over you, 
when you look on the daisies springing above the 
grassy mounds where their little forms have been 
laid, when you come home at night and find the 
vacant places silent and deserted, when all the 
days of summer and winter are full of touches 
and suggestions of them, when you cannot look up 
to God or look down to yourself without thinking 
of them ; in short, when it is only by the power of 
imagination you can have them with you again — 
ah, 'tis then you think most of them. 

The invisible children become the most real chil- 
dren, the sweetest, the truest, the dearest ; the chil- 
dren that touch our hearts as no hands of flesh 
can do. 

This truth that the children whom God has 
taken away are our permanent possessions is thus 
happily phrased by Tennyson : 

. . . God gives us love; 
Something to love he lends us; 
But when love is grown 
To ripeness, that on which it throve 
Falls off and love is left alone. 

A child's death always brings new blessings to 
the home — it connects as it were with heaven. 
Many examples could be given of the changes 

210 



OUR CHILDREN IN HEAVEN 

brought about in worldly-minded men and women 
through the passing away of one of their children, 
how it brings them to a realization of their depend- 
ence on a higher Power. 

To Lowell the death of his child was like a new 
marriage : 

... I felt instantly 
Deep in my soul another bond to thee 
Thrill with that life we saw depart from here — 
0, mother your angel child! twice dear — 
Death knits as well as parts. 

Tennyson was a man not given to sentiment ; his 
was a serious strong nature, but at times it could 
be moved when the passions would play over his 
soul like the winds o'er the strings of an .ZEolian 
harp. Here is one of the most beautiful senti- 
ments that ever fell from his lips. The lines 
sound like a dirge, every word is like a requiem : 

As thro' the land at eve we went, 

And plucked the ripened ears, 
We fell out, my wife and I, 
O, we fell out, — I know not why, 

And kissed again with tears. 

For when we came where lies the child 

We lost in other years, 
There above the little grave, 

We kissed again with tears. 

When Christian faith rules our life the child 
shall surely not have come in vain, though brief 
may be the stay. And with Lowell again we 
can see — 

211 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

'Tis sorrow builds the shining ladder up 
Whose golden rounds are our calamities, 
Whereon our firm feet planting, nearer God, 
The spirit climbs and hath its eyes unsealed. 

Through the clouded glass 
Our old bitter tears we learn to look 
Undazzled on the kindness of God's face; 
Earth is too dark and Heaven shines through. 



Our Heavenly Home 



Surely yon heaven, where angels see God's face, 

Is not so distant as we deem 
From this low earth! Tis but a little space, 
The narrow crossing of a slender stream; 
'Tis but a mist which winds might blow aside, 
Yes, these are all that us of earth divide 
From the bright dwellings of the glorified; 

The land of which I dream. — Horatius Bonar. 



There is a land where beauty will not fade, 

Nor sorrow dim the eye; 
Where true hearts will not shrink nor be dismayed 

And love will never die. 
Tell me — I fain would go, 
For I am burdened with a heavy woe; 
The beautiful have left me all alone; 
The true, the tender from my path are gone; 
And I am weak and fainting with despair; 
Where is it? Tell me, where! 

Friend, thou must trust in Him who trod before 

The desolate paths of life; 
Must bear in meekness, as He meekly bore, 

Sorrow and toil and strife. 
Think how the Son of God 
These thorny paths hath trod; 
Think how he longed to go, 
Yet tarried out for thee the appointed woe; 
Think of His loneliness in places dim, 
When no man comforted nor cared for Him; 
Think how He prayed, unaided and alone, 
In that dread agony, "Thy will be done!" 
Friend, do not thou despair, 

Christ, in His heaven of heavens, will hear thy prayer.. 
— From the German of Uhland. 



CHAPTER VIII 
Our Heavenly Home 

A futuee state has been man's chief concern 
since the gray morning of primeval time when he 
was first ushered into the world as its lord and 
master, the crowning work of an Almighty Hand. 

He looked around and with wondering gaze 
observed the face of nature, earth and sky and 
sea, the sun, the moon and the stars, tree and 
plant and flower, the rest of animal creation, and 
he marveled at his own being. 

Whence was he and whither was he drifting? 

The inner voice of conscience, the divine voice, 
whispered to him that there was a power respon- 
sible for his presence and that there was, "A rock 
higher than he, ' ' and that the power and the rock 
were God, the Omnipotent, the Almighty who had 
drawn him out of nothing and placed him here as 
overseer of the rest of his wonderful creation. 

The first man walked with God, but after a 
time, becoming conscious of his power and arro- 
gant of his sway, be became vain, and in his vanity 
sought to cast off the yoke of a master. He was 

217 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

encouraged in his pride and arrogance by the 
woman and she tempted him to transgress the 
command of his Superior, to throw off his alle- 
giance and commit the sin of disobedience. It was 
this sin that brought death and woe into the 
world. 

Death! what was it? It was a phenomenon 
these early ancestors of the race could not under- 
stand, and to us, their descendants, the mystery 
is as deep as ever, the riddle is still unsolved. 

They, like us, saw their fellows passing away, 
saw the cessation of life in the living, breathing 
bodies, and to this cessation they gave the name 
of Death, which means a passing away beyond 
the mortal ken of earth. All animate nature died 
as well as man, the beasts of the field, the trees of 
the forest, the flowers of the field, and new forms 
took their places in an ever-recurring succession. 
It was simply change, change from one life to that 
of another. 

But what was the other life of man? That was, 
and is, the eternal question to which the answer is 
as yet incomplete. 

It was felt, realized, borne home from the 
beginning that death, the decay of the body, was 
not the end of man, that there was another part, 
an immortal part, the soul, which should live for- 

218 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

ever, but in what state — that was the mystery 
which engrossed them, and which still engrosses 
the minds of thinkers and philosophers to the 
present day. 

In those early ages of the world men were close 
to nature. The swarthy, black-bearded fathers of 
the race in Eastern lands daily watched the ever- 
changing phenomena of night and day, the recur- 
rence of the seasons, the birth, growth and decay 
of life. At night they came out on the hills and 
in wondering admiration gazed upon the starry 
firmament, with its myriads of glittering bodies. 
Then they began to take notice of the revolutions 
of the sun and the moon and the planets until they 
evolved an astronomy of their own, but though 
the effect was apparent to their senses, the cause 
was wholly unknown. 

They knew there was a motive power beyond, 
but they could not remove the veil and take a 
glance within. 

Death the Gate of Life 

The veil is still there and we may not penetrate 
it with mortal eyes. Only the vision of faith can 
look on the other side. 

What is on that other side must be largely con- 
jecture until the gates of death open for us, and 

219 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

we are ushered into the full revelation of all 
mystery. 

Death is the gate of life, and once we cross its 
portals we know that what is now dark shall be 
made clear ; what is now the unknowable shall be 
the known. 

That death is not the end of all we are convinced 
even without revelation. There is something on 
the other side of the boundary line. There is a 
future existence, but whether of happiness or mis- 
ery, depends upon our actions in this mortal life. 

The future state of happiness we call by the 
name of heaven. That heaven is not apocryphal, 
but a real state of bliss. It is not a matter of 
simple belief or faith, but of revelation, though 
such revelation is not as clear as we would wish, 
the future abode of bliss being but partly made 
known through the sacred writings. 

Glimpses of the Coming World 

True, in the Bible, especially the New Testa- 
ment, we have many allusions, yet these lift only a 
corner of the curtain and give us but a glimpse of 
the hereafter. 

Even the apostle John, who more than any 
other authority, is regarded not merely as the 
most authentic, but the clearest, has this to 

220 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

say: "It doth not yet appear what we shall be." 

However, since the days of the apostles, not 
only physical, but metaphysical science has been 
advancing and man has progressed so far that we 
are beginning to see a faint ray of the light that 
lies beyond. As yet we can only gaze as ' ' through 
a glass darkly," bnt the vision is becoming 
plainer, especially when onr spiritual sight is 
quickened by a firm faith. 

Of course, for any kind of definiteness we have 
to depend upon the inspired writers of the New 
Testament. In spirit these men walked with God, 
and they have conveyed to us some idea of the 
grandeur, the glory, the magnificence and the hap- 
piness of heaven. 

While their descriptions are figurative, and not 
to be literally interpreted, yet they serve the pur- 
pose of giving us some knowledge, however inade- 
quate, of our heavenly home, its occupations and 
delights. 

But all that heaven means is beyond our finite 
limits to comprehend here and now. For example 
it is said, — "God will be the temple in the midst 
of it. ' ' How can our feeble imaginations conceive 
such a temple, built of the God-head, its walls his 
attributes, its roof his majesty, its gates his eter- 
nity, and his redeemed people dwelling therein and 

221 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

offering their devotion and adoration at its altars? 
John, describing his ecstatic vision, spoke sym- 
bolically of the glories of the hereafter — its 
foundations of amethyst, its streets of gold and its 
gates of pearl, but in the Apocalypse when he 
soared to the full height of his theme, he dis- 
carded all the trappings of the material world, 
abandoned all comparisons with earthly grandeur 
and of nature's magnificence, and speaking from 
a purely spiritual illumination, he tells us that, 
i 'The city had no need of the sun to shine in it, 
for the glory of God did lighten it and the Lamb 
is the light thereof." 

The Concealment of Heaven 

But what idea can we have of an immeasurable 
vault converted into one brilliant manifestation of 
divinity, the splendid corruscations of righteous- 
ness, of truth, of justice and loving kindness 
weaving themselves together to form the arch, and 
the burning brightness of him who cannot "look 
on iniquity," shining as the lightning, not to 
scathe, but to illumine and glorify the surround- 
ings with his presence. 

What idea can we, who have seen only the scin- 
tillating orbs of a material firmament, conjure up 
of the great Luminary of Heaven whose light 

222 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

penetrates beyond suns and systems where there 
is no beginning nor shall ever be an end ! 

God in His own inscrutable wisdom may have 
good reason for giving us but a partial glimpse of 
heaven's beauties and delights. The obscuration 
of its glories while we are in the mortal life may 
be an arrangement of the divine designs to make 
us worthy of such a blessed home and eager to 
work and serve him to attain it 

A full revelation of heaven would wholly unfit 
us for the present world; the contrast would be 
too great for mortal mind to bear. A story is 
recorded of a crew returning to their native coun- 
try, France, after many years' absence in the 
Dutch East Indies. As the men approached the 
shores of their native land, so eager were they to 
catch a glimpse of its beloved landscape, that some 
of them mounted the rigging, some clung to the 
spars, while others adjusted their glasses to get 
a first view. Suddenly one of their number, eagerly 
on the lookout, exclaimed, " Yonder it is!" and 
when all eyes were cast in the direction indicated, 
and they began to discover the tops of the hills 
and then the towers and houses, reminding them 
of beloved scenes in which they had been brought 
up, they could scarcely contain themselves for joy. 
They dressed themselves in their best apparel and 

223 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

seized the presents they had brought for their 
friends. Many of these friends had assembled 
on the quay to greet the returning ones, and so 
eager were the wanderers to embrace their kindred 
that they leaped from the ship to the shore, so that 
the vessel had to be brought to her moorings by 
other hands. 

If we could gaze on the magnificent scenery of 
the heavenly land, if we could look upon the eter- 
nal city with its pearly gates and golden streets, 
and could actually behold our glorified friends and 
relatives, neighbors and companions, ready to 
receive us into their holy and happy fellowship, 
how eager we should be to embrace them, and 
what an overwhelming effect would such a glorious 
reunion have upon us! We should be wrapped 
in an ecstasy of delight and our souls would thrill 
with a heavenly joy. No earthly concerns could 
have the power of engaging our attention for a 
transitory moment ; every consideration would be 
sunk to the all-absorbing interest of again meet- 
ing the loved ones in the eternal home. 



l & 



Why Full Vision Denied 

Could we gain such a vision of the blessed coun- 
try, but were denied the privilege of entering and 
sent back to earth, how we should languish in our 

224 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

tabernacle of dust and long for the day when we 
conld go forth from its confines, free for the glori- 
ous translation that would make us heirs forever 
of the immortal kingdom. Until that hour, we 
should wander the earth as melancholy exiles, 
pining for the home above. 

Therefore, it is well that we do not get a full 
revelation of heaven and its joys, for we should 
not be content to abide our time, and earth would 
become so dreary that we should lose all interest 
in its affairs and so neglect to do our part as we 
should while occupying the tenements of clay. 

Overpowering Scenes 

"When Moses said, "0, Lord, I beseech Thee, show 
me thy glory,' ' God heard his petition as far as 
it was proper, but reminded him beforehand, 
' 'Thou canst not see my face and live." There- 
fore, when he was passing, the Lord hid his face 
in clouds of storm, the thunders burst forth and 
the lightnings flashed and his servant, Moses, was 
placed in a cleft of the rock lest he might be over- 
powered and destroyed. 

When John, in his exile in the iEgean Sea, saw 
Jesus, though he had been familiar with him, and 
had leaned upon his bosom, "he fell at the 
Master's feet as dead." 

225 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Again, the disciples on the Monnt of the Trans- 
figuration "fell asleep," and this sleep was not 
the result of natural infirmity, but came from the 
reverential awe with which their Lord and Master 
inspired them. Their poor human nature was 
overpowered with the glory of the scene and had 
to succumb. 

The concealment of the bliss and splendors of 
heaven more deeply impresses us with a sense of 
its surpassing glory. That which is the object of 
our hope and the realization of our faith is beyond 
the power of the finite understanding and baffles 
imagination itself. It is unknown, not because it 
is unreal, bat because it transcends. 

Heaven Indescribable 

The indescribableness of the home of the 
blessed, the fact that it is too dazzling for us at 
present to behold, is shown by the statement of St. 
John that "it doth not yet appear what we shall 
be, ,, and by that of St. Paul, who, after his rap- 
ture into the third heaven, said he was ' ' caught up 
into paradise and heard unspeakable words which 
it is not lawful for a man to utter" (II. Cor. 12 : 4). 
"The loftiness of the towering mountain causes 
its head to be hidden in the clouds." 

There is a grand and animating power in the 
226 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

reflection that thought itself cannot measure our 
everlasting portion, and faith and hope may be 
both strengthened by this very impossibility. 

Yet there are certain general ideas that under- 
lie and permeate the figurative language of the 
Scriptures and without doing injustice to this 
language, we can obtain certain definite concep- 
tions of what the heavenly home may be like. 

Though we can catch but a glimpse, enough is 
still revealed to cheer us in its contemplation, to 
exalt our highest hopes and to stimulate us to ever- 
increasing diligence to appropriate it. 

Earth with its petty pomps and pageantries, is 
but evanescent and hollow at the best and can only 
serve as a place of exile, where by a little suffer- 
ing and a little service we can prepare for the 
higher life which will burst with all its splendors 
upon us when free from the body of death we shall 
enter the pearly portals of life everlasting. 

Heaven is the prize 

My soul shall strive to gain — 
One glimpse of Paradise 

Repays a life of pain. 

Heaven a Place 

If heaven is a real place it must have location. 
There can be no home without a site, no citadel 
without a foundation. 

Not to speak of biblical revelation, reason and 

227 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

common sense could not entertain the conception 
of an abode where so many dwell as having no 
material position in the realms of reality. 

If such a view could be taken so contrary to the 
conceptions of the physical senses, heaven would 
be but a figment of the imagination and all our 
beautiful dreams concerning it would pass away 
like a reflection of sunlight on a mirror with no 
hope whatever of their realization. The glory and 
magnificence we love to picture would be nought 
but a magic loveliness, a fairy nothingness like the 
shining strands of fancy which we weave around 
some of our excited imagination. 

John's Vision 

True, heaven may not be and undoubtedly is not 
literally a gilded city of amethystine buildings 
and golden streets and pearly gates as given to us 
in the ecstatic vision of the good St. John. The 
mind of the favored apostle was brought up to 
such a degree of spiritual fervor that ordinary 
language failed him to convey fitting ideas of the 
glories he beheld with the eyes of faith, and so 
he uses figurative terms, taking for comparison 
the grandest and costliest treasures of earth, in 
order, in some measure, to give us a conception of 
the riches and splendors of the hereafter. 

228 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

There are some, who, forgetting, or rather ignor- 
ing, the inspired writings, look npon the heaven 
of John as merely the excited conjuration of a 
man whose zeal had gotten the better of his judg- 
ment, that he was simply in a trance brought about 
by his own enthusiasm. 

These are the disputers of a material heaven, 
and their claim is that it is not a place, but a state 
of soul without reference to locality. Their belief 
is that man at death is but lifted out of his earthly 
and perishable abode and translated into a spirit- 
ual condition where his soul is etherialized, filling 
all space and happy in its universal being. 

But this view is neither more nor less than 
pantheism, which takes from God the attribute of 
individuality and represents him as a constitu- 
tion of the whole material universe and the soul of 
man a part of this supreme whole. 

Yet if heaven were but a state of being, that 
state would imply existence somewhere. The ex- 
pressions, "in heaven," "to heaven," "from 
heaven," "out of heaven," etc., used from man's 
first conception of a hereafter, indicate that the 
belief that heaven is a place, has always been 
universal. A human being consists of soul and 
body, these two united make the man, and they 
must therefore be united again in the future world 

229 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

if man is to retain his nature, and the glorified 
must have a local platform for his future habi- 
tation. 

But we have the testimony of One greater than 
any apostle, the testimony of Jesus himself as to 
the actual reality of heaven as the abode of the 
righteous after death. "I go to prepare a place 
for you," said the Saviour to his disciples, "and 
if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come 
again and receive you unto myself, that where I 
am, there ye may be also." These words should 
surely place the answer to the question as to a 
material heaven beyond doubt or cavil. 

Where is Heaven ? 

Where the location of the home of the blessed is, 
we know not and all speculations concerning it are 
more ingenious than satisfactory. Eevelation does 
not tell its location and human knowledge is even 
powerless to conjecture. Although the physical 
sciences have advanced with mighty strides, and 
numberless secrets have been wrested from 
Nature's bosom, though the riddle of the stars has 
been read and the revolutions of worlds foretold, 
not a single ray of light has yet been shed upon 
the great mystery of the hereafter. 

Our only information depends solely on the 
230 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

inspired words of sacred Scripture and these give 
us no inkling at all of the location of heaven, or 
where it may be within the limits of space. 

The general idea is that it must be somewhere 
above, but this conception mostly arises from the 
literal interpretation of the word. Heaven comes 
from the verb to heave, something heaved up, that 
is, elevated, as the top of a hill or the roof of a 
temple, and in all languages it has a similar sig- 
nificance. 

Though the Scriptures shed no light on the 
position of the heavenly hereafter, there can be no 
mistaken idea as to their meaning in regard to its 
reality as an actual place. 

In referring to it the Bible uses four words of 
explicit meaning, easily understood by all. It 
speaks of heaven as a kingdom, a country, a city 
and a home. 

Heaven a Kingdom 

We are told by Christ that heaven is a king- 
dom, a glorious realm where happy millions live in 
obedience to him who sits upon the throne. It has 
mighty armies, but no wars. Among the multi- 
tudes there is no tumult, and though the voices are 
as loud as the roar of the sea breaking upon a 
rocky shore, the sound is a melodious harmony 
with no note of discord to jar its mighty music. 

231 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

The enthroned King sends forth his messengers, 
making them ministers of good wherever they go. 
The subjects are all loyal, for it is a kingdom of 
righteousness, of peace, of love, where stormy con- 
flicts never come, where the conntless millions live 
in closest union and never think or do one another 
wrong or injustice, where the greatest deem them- 
selves the least in self-esteem, and the least are 
elevated to greatness by the power of love, where 
truth and knowledge prevail and the darkness of 
ignorance and error never enters to cast a shadow, 
where light shines eternal and a full happiness 
basks in its genial glow, where boundless riches 
abide and endless activity is a pleasure, a kingdom 
where all allegiance to its ruler is the highest law, 
and where his service confers infinite delight. 

Heaven a Country 

The second biblical simile of heaven is that of 
a Country, with landscapes as various as the hills 
and valleys of earth, a land of beautiful and fertile 
pastures, where the loving Shepherd leads his 
flock to the living fountains of sparkling waters, 
where the trees and plants bring forth luscious 
fruits for the nourishment of all, where the flowers 
and where parting is unknown, the great family, 
cover the fields in rainbow colors and exhale a per- 

232 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

fume that entrances the soul, where the seas and 
lakes are as clear as the polished crystal, where 
the rivers wind like silver threads beneath the 
shaded banks, where countless millions walk in the 
cool glow under iridescent stars — a country with 
all the reality that belongs to the various features 
of earth, with all the diversity of changing scene 
and charm of physical loveliness, with a climate 
congenial to its inhabitants, where toil is rest, and 
rest is joy, and where the soul is ever progressing 
to higher and yet higher conditions of happiness 
and bliss. 

This heavenly country is not an abstract crea- 
tion of feeling or of faith, but a country as real 
and definite as anything we touch with our hands 
or see with our eyes. It is a land of pleasures and 
delights free from the grime of guilt and the shade 
of sorrow and the slime of sin. 

No pestilence comes there to blight and wither 
with pestiferous breath, no lightnings smite, nor 
storms destroy, nor panics impoverish, nor tyrants 
trample on others ' right; where there is no fear 
to blight the heart or palsy the limbs, but where 
all are strong and valiant and powerful in the love 
and service of the Master, and where there is per- 
petual development to larger and broader prin- 
ciples of being. 

233 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
Heaven a City 

The third conception which the Bible gives of 
heaven is that of a City, with golden streets and 
gates of pearl and walls of precious stones. But 
this description, as we have considered, is but 
metaphysical, the spiritual ecstasy of one who was 
transfused with joy, whose soul melted in wonder 
and admiration at the celestial vision. Yet as a 
city we may consider the architecture of the 
shining towers and temples built by divine hands, 
a city whose streets are illumined with the sun- 
broods the white spirit of peace, where no violence 
or disturbance ever mars the serenity, where no 
voice of anger is raised, no tone of discord is 
heard, where the music of the harps floats out on 
the perfumed, ambient air, swept by fingers that 
will never feel the touch of pain, the chords vibra- 
ting an angelic music that ravishes the soul, a city 
whose grandeur shall not decay because built on 
the adamantine rocks of eternity, whose popula- 
tion will not diminish, a city of many mansions 
where there is room enough for all. 

Heaven a Home 

The remaining reference to heaven makes it a 
Home where the weary and heavy laden can rest 
from their toils, where sorrowing will cease and 

234 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

sighing and weeping shall be heard no more, 
where sympathy and fraternity are in every look, 
and sonl answers sonl in the glance of love, where 
one dwells with another in the satisfying bond of 
immortal union, where sorrow shall never obtrude, 
and where parting is unknown, the great family, 
Grod's family, living from age to age and flourish- 
ing in immortal youth. 

Of all the figures of heaven, perhaps it is this 
one representing it as a home which appeals to us 
most. The word dwells in our affections and con- 
veys to us a meaning which no other term can 
give. Home is the best beloved of all places, for 
it is the center of all love, the focus of every yearn- 
ing that draws the heart and soul to its blessed 
sanctuary. No other spot has such a hold upon 
us. It is the magnet that draws us to itself, and 
from which we refuse to be torn away. 

The doors of the heavenly home are ever open, 
and there is a welcome for all. Friend will meet 
friend, neighbor will be joined to neighbor in the 
heavenly reunion, never again to part but to 
mingle and love eternally in a blessed com- 
panionship. 

The doors of this heavenly home were flung 
open by the sacrifice of the God-man, Jesus, on 
the Cross of Calvary, and all who will may enter, 

385 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

after passing the boundary line of mortal death, 
if only they have been purified by the atoning 
blood of Christ, and have lived as far as possible 
the Christly life. All sin and stain of the flesh 
and spirit must be washed away, for nothing 
nnclean can enter heaven, but if we walk in the 
light — as he is in the light — the blood of Jesus 
Christ his son cleanseth us from all sin, and by 
him our entrance into paradise is assured. 

When you come to the gates you must tender 
your credentials that you have been a true servant 
of the Master, and have done his will on earth to 
the best of your ability. 

No Sect in Heaven 

You will not be asked what denominational re- 
ligion you espoused, at what altar you knelt in 
life, whether you are an Episcopalian or a Catho- 
lic, a Baptist or a Presbyterian or a Methodist, 
whether you believed in the "Thirty-nine Arti- 
cles" or rejected the doctrine of infant baptism. 
All such differences of belief are but mere earthly 
trifles which will not be taken cognizance of in the 
issue of your admittance into the home of glory. 

All that will be required will be a clean balance 
sheet. That will be the only letter of marque 
required to admit your craft into the eternal port. 

236 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

Heaven is real, heaven is earnest, and it is not a 
chimera of the imagination. Let us then keep the 
eye of faith and the heart of hope on the eternal 
city and so conduct our lives that each one of us 
may be worthy to enter its gates after we shall 
have shed the mask of mortality and be hailed 
with the welcome, "Well done, thou good and 
faithful servant, enter into the joy of the Lord." 

Heaven's Open Door 

The doors of the heavenly home are never 
locked ; the bolts are never fastened on those who 
seek admission with the requisite depositions of 
pure spirits and contrite hearts for the sins com- 
mitted in the earthly life. The souls that long 
for the love and satiety of God's presence are 
never made to stand outside or to be turned away 
with refusal, but words of welcome, comfort and 
cheer await all who approach with the confidence 
that arises from work well performed, service 
well done for the cause of the Master. 

With the eyes of hope you have been gazing on 
the celestial resting place through the years of 
earthly existence, but still you may have a fear 
that you have not so borne your part in the con- 
flict as to merit the reward of admittance. You 
must not be cast down at this retrospection; you 

237 



After death— what? 
must take heart of grace and rely wholly on divine 
promise and divine love. The great Father- 
heart of God wishes yon to come there, and he 
places at your disposal the means to gain the end. 
It will not be his fault if you do not obtain it, but 
your own. 

No matter how far you have wandered on the 
wrong path and strayed in the blind alley-ways of 
sin, there is always an opening through which you 
can pass into the right road and so reach the cov- 
eted destination of your hopes, the home for which 
the heart has been sighing, from the first dawn of 
reason, until reason ceases to illuminate your 
earthly life. 

Heaven is the lodestone, the magnet that ever 
attracts the soul of man, and though other forces 
of sin and evil try hard to draw it away, it never- 
theless always turns in the one direction, toward 
the Creator who gave it being. 

The house where God dwells is the goal of your 
pilgrimage. You want to go there, for there you 
hope to meet the friends who have gone before 
and welcome those who shall come after. You 
want to be there when the sounds of mighty joy 
arise to welcome the wanderer home and the 
choruses of praise go up for the erring who have 
been gathered into the bosom of the Father. 

238 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 
The Will and the Way 

You can be there if you will, to join your voice 
with the angelic bands in the commingled music 
of the spheres, the melody of which reverberates 
through the unending aisles of eternity. 

You, my aged brother, upon whose head the 
silvery frost of time has fallen thickly, on whose 
brow the passing years have furrowed deep the 
lines of worldly cares, whose step is tottering 
feebly down the incline of earthly life, and whose 
feet are blistered with the tedious journey. Do 
you not long for the heavenly rest, when you can 
lay your burden down at the feet of your God, 
when your bowed and broken frame will again 
stand erect in immortal manhood, when the 
wrinkles shall be pressed from your corrugated 
brow and your withered face shall be clothed 
again with the freshness of eternal youth? 

Oh, yes, you long for the hour of deliverance 
when the soul unfettered shall wing her flight to 
the door of the eternal home. That door is open 
and there you will find a strong hand to guide 
your steps within and set your feet on the shining 
floor, the talismanic touch of which shall waken 
them to everlasting elasticity in the eternal life. 

! ye weary and heavy laden toilers in the work- 
shops of the world, where blood and bone and 

239 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

brain are exhausted in the ceaseless competition, 
yon pitifnl creatures in the cares and anxieties of 
trade which sap your strength and deaden your 
energies, you in the haps and hazards of business 
which ruthlessly grind you beneath their merci- 
less wheels, you in the factory and sweatshops, at 
the loom and in the mill, in the drudgery of the 
household and amid the clank and clangor, stress 
and strain of earth's crushing rush and bustle, do 
you not long for the hour of mortal dissolution 
when you shall be emancipated and free to enter 
your Father's house where there will be no cares, 
nor sorrows, nor sighing and weeping, where you 
will engage in occupations that bring no weari- 
ness, work that will be a pleasure and not a pain, 
where you can walk the streets and see no anxious 
faces, mingle in society where none complains and 
join the happy bands on whose shining faces is 
reflected the smile of God's approval and the glory 
of his love. Do you not want to be there — a mem- 
ber of that household where no strife can enter 
nor cares annoy? 

The Struggle for a Home 

You struggle hard to buy or build an earthly 
house, which will be your home for a time. By 
every means in your power you strive to improve 

240 



OUR HEAVENLY HOME 

your condition, yet withal yon are never satisfied. 
Where yon expect peace yon find unrest, where 
you had hoped to find happiness you discover only 
misery. Do what you will, life is but a round of 
pain and sorrow, a nightmare of horror from 
which you unceasingly pray to awaken. The 
house you build, be its grandeur what it may, fails 
to satisfy the heart and the yearnings of the soul 
which become more intense as time passes within 
its walls. Do you not then wish for the heavenly 
house built by God, where everything is pleasant 
and agreeable, exactly what you want, and where 
no change could make it better or more to your 
liking? 

You can have this house, if you will. The 
hand that drew the universe out of nothing has 
fashioned it for you, for your eternal use and hap- 
piness, and made it so perfect that the experience 
of ages shall never find defect in its structure or 
stain upon its beauty. You can have it if you will. 

Revelation Satisfies 

The revelation of immortality that sets heaven 
before us as a country, a city, a kingdom and a 
home, satisfies every want. There are possessions 
in that country for everyone, mansions in that 
city for the poor and the friendless, riches in that 

241 



AFTER DEATH—WHAT? 

kingdom to supply every want, and a seat in that 
home to give rest to all the weary and heavy laden. 

When you think of heaven as a. home does it not 
fill your soul with joy, the thought that some- 
body is waiting for you there, waiting to welcome 
you when you first come, to greet you with the 
handclasp of eternal brotherhood and introduce 
you to others who wish to know you too and tell 
them that you have come to stay with them for- 
ever. Oh, does it not make you eager to reach 
that happy home of the blessed where the sun ever 
shines and all is radiated by the warmth of God's 
presence and his all overshadowing love? 

How you must wish to join the circle of friends 
already there, the families of your own kindred, 
the members of your own fireside where you can 
redeem the promise made them, when with the 
last farewell sigh of earth they said to you, "Meet 
me there, I shall wait for your coming. ' ' 



What is Heaven and How to Reach It 



The saints of God, their wanderings done, 

No more their weary course they run; 

No more they faint, no more they fall; 

No foes oppress, no fears appall. 

O, happy saints forever blest 

In that dear home, how sweet you rest ! 

— William D. Maclagen. 



No shadows yonder! 

All light and song; 
Each day I wonder, 

And say, How long 
Shall time me sunder 

From that dear throng? 

No weeping yonder! 

All fled away; 
While here I wander 

Each weary day, 
And sigh as I ponder 

My long, long stay. 

No partings yonder! 

Time and space never 
Again shall sunder; 

Hearts cannot sever; 
Dearer and fonder 

Hands clasp forever. 

None wanting yonder, 

Bought by the Lamb! 
All gathered under 

The evergreen palm; 
Loud as night's thunder 

Ascends the glad psalm. 

■ — Her alius Bonar. 



CHAPTER IX 
What is Heaven and How to Reach It 

The heaven idea is implanted in the breasts of 
all human kind, and no force or circumstance, or 
change can eradicate it, because it is the divine 
spark that kindles a belief in an immortality and 
enables man to see his dependence on a power 
higher than himself. The savage with all his 
uncultured wildness feels it burning within the 
innermost depths of his consciousness and realizes 
that it is his guide to some higher state of being. 

The pagan of an ancient time looked beyond the 
prospective of earth and knew that the grave was 
not the goal of life, but there was another bank 
to the river that bounded his finite existence. 

The Greek had his Elysian fields wherein his 
fancy conjured up the forms of the dead heroes of 
his race the same as they appeared while in life. 
Often the eidolon of some one with whom he had 
been intimately associated appeared so real to 
him that he would address it and talk to it as a 
thing of life, though, of course, he received no 
answer. These eidola of the Greeks, that is, 

247 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

images of the dead, played an important part in 
the mythology of that mighty empire and formed 
a theme for the pens of many of her illustrious 
bards. 

The ancient Hellenes also had their "Islands of 
the Blest/ ' to which the spirits of the departed 
were supposed to be wafted by unseen hands. 
Byron refers to this belief in one of his most 
beautiful poems, entitled, The Isles of Greece. 
Pindar, the father of lyric poetry, gives confirma- 
tion of this faith in the existence of his compa- 
triots in a future state. The following ode was 
written about 400 B.C. : 

The islands of the blest they say, 

The islands of the blest 
Are peaceful and happy by night and day 
Far away in the glorious west. 

They need not the moon in that land of delight, 

They need not the pale, pale star; 
The sun he is bright by day and by night 

Where the souls of the blessed are. 

They till not the ground, they plough not the wave, 

They labor not — never! oh, never! 
Not a tear do they shed, not a sigh do they heave, 

They are happy for ever and ever. 

Soft is the breeze, like the evening one, 

When the sun hath gone to rest ; 
And the sky is pure, and of clouds there are none 

In the islands of the blest. 

The deep, clear sea, in its mazy bed, 

Doth garlands of gems unfold; 
Not a tree but it blazes with crowns for the dead 

Even flowers of living gold. 

248 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

In this early morning of history we find many 
other examples of illustrious nations of the pagan 
world believing in a state of immortality. The 
old Eomans believed that the spirits of the dead 
were translated to Mount Olympus to mingle and 
live forever with the deities that presided over 
their destinies. Some of them were strong in the 
belief that the souls of their heroes did not pass 
on, but took the places of less valiant ones to 
animate their bodies to mighty deeds. This 
metempsychosis or transmigration of souls is 
different from the doctrine taught by Pythagoras 
which was that the souls of men entered into ani- 
mal bodies, yet it is as old as the world, and is still 
held by some of the savage tribes, notably by the 
aborigines of Australia, though in a somewhat 
different conception. 

The black men of the Southern Continent look 
upon the white men as their own dead brought 
back to life for deeds of bravery performed in the 
anterior existence. And this is all the more 
strange when it is taken into consideration that 
the native Australians are said to have no affinity 
with any other race of mankind — that they stand 
alone and unique by themselves in the ethnology 
of the species. How comes it then that this de- 
graded, savage people, but little elevated above the 

249 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

brute creation, should have views about the future 
state almost identical with the polished, refined 
and highly cultivated, though pagan Eomans and 
after such a great lapse of time ! It is a question 
in psychology and can be based only on that yearn- 
ing in the human heart which ever craves a higher 
state of existence. 

Of course, in the early stages of the world, God 
revealed himself to man, but after a time, sin so 
clouded the lives of men that they wandered away 
in the darkness and were brought back only by 
the pure light of the Gospel, dawning like an 
aurora over the blackened hills of earth. But 
until that time they had many beliefs. Still they 
never totally disregarded the idea of some govern- 
ing force to regulate their lives and destiny. 

We have seen that the Greeks and Eomans 
believed in the immortality of the soul and 'tis 
said some of them had conceptions of the true 
God. The other European nations too, when 
steeped in barbarism, did not ignore, but had im- 
plicit faith in another state of being. 

Ancient European Notions 

The Scandinavians dreamt of a green paradise 
awaiting them beyond the gates of earth with fields 
of waving flowers, singing birds and murmuring 

250 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

streams flashing in a sunlight that would never set. 
The cold, sanguinary Vikings of the Northland 
believed that here their warriors would gain the 
rest so well earned by lives of daring deeds. 

The Teutonic heaven was a land of pleasure, 
fulness and fruitage where every want could be 
satisfied to the soul's- contentment. 

The old Iberians saw castles and chateaux of 
gold and ivory, where music ever filled the air with 
its delicious strains. 

There has been no nation, in which a belief of a 
future state has not obtained, none that has not 
imagined that there remains for holy souls beyond 
the grave some 

. . . Island valley of Avilion 
Where fall not hail or rain or any snow, 
Nor ever wind blows loudly. 

When the star of Christianity rose above the 
horizon, all darkness that surrounded a belief in 
a hereafter was swept away, and through the pure 
light of the Gospel of Christ men were enabled to 
catch a glimpse of the celestial paradise which 
Christ came to open for an erring race. 

Christ came into the world to be the " light of the 
world, the light that enlighteneth every man that 
cometh into the world.' ' He came to point and 
lead the way to the heavenly home. 

251 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

What the glories of that home shall be no pen 
can write, no tongue describe, but in order that 
Christians may give soul form to that which can- 
not be uttered, they have dwelt with rapture on 
the glowing symbols of the poet of the Apocalypse, 
when he ecstatically refers to the New Jerusalem 
descending out of heaven, having the glory of God, 
and her light like unto a stone most precious, even 
unto a jasper stone; and the gates of pearl and 
the foundations of precious stones, and the pure 
river of the water of life, clear as a crystal, and 
the Tree of Life with its leaves for the healing of 
the nations. 

Apostolic Symbols 

Though the language of the apostle is symbol- 
ical, we can overlook its extravagance of hyperbole 
in the exquisite ideas it conveys to our minds 
which ever appeal to us with the same freshness 
and sweetness as in the days of childhood when we 
lisped the hymns so dear to the Christian worship, 
"Jerusalem the Golden, " " There is a land of pure 
delight, ' ' " There is a green hill far away. ' ' 

These symbolic passages thrill the soul and 
quicken every impulse of religion. They trans- 
late us in spirit to the home above, where we, too, 
like John, can see the ecstatic vision. Yet after 
all they do not take such a deep hold upon us, or 

252 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

claim such consideration from us as the less lofty 

allusions, bare of all figurative rhetoric, which tell 

us in simple words of the higher life which is free 

from the pains and agonies of this mortal life, and 

which describe to us the vision of God undarkened 

by the mists of sin. 

How exalted, however, was that vision of John 

in Patmos, and how blessed is the consolation of 

the words — " Neither shall there be any more 
pain ! ' ' 

No Pain in Heaven 

No, there shall be no more pain ; no pain of body 
or of mind ; no pain of homesickness ; no pain of 
exile ; no pain of exposure ; no pain of disappoint- 
ment. 

In the past you have planned and worried and 
persisted, until your hands were worn, your body 
bent and your brain racked, but all in vain. De- 
spite every effort you were defeated. You tugged 
and you tussled, but your strength was overborne 
by greater odds and you had to give in to superior 
force. When you thought you had breasted the 
waves, they swept you down to greater depths, 
and when your feet were almost on the shore you 
slipped and fell back again more helpless than 
ever. Instead of gains you had losses. What 
you would save one day would have to be spent the 

253 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

next, and yon never conld make ends meet, strive 
how yon wonld. All these yon had to bear nntil 
yonr heart cried ont that yon conld suffer no more. 

Now, all these evils are past, and are bnried in 
the oblivion of time never to be resurrected. There 
will be no more trials nor troubles, nor sighs nor 
sorrows; no waiting nor weariness — everything 
will be to yonr desires, every thought will be an- 
ticipated, and every wish gratified. 

In heaven yon never again will have a blasted 
hope ; the fairest yearnings shall be realized to the 
full, the wildest ambition satisfied, the most san- 
guine hopes attained. Your robe shall be richer 
and your crown brighter than any of which yon 
have dreamed on earth. 

No Hunger in Heaven 

Here it is hard to have the flour barrel empty 
and your children crying for bread, hard to see 
them droop and pine and wither away beneath 
the gaunt clutch of hunger, with neither food nor 
doctor to relieve their 'wants or keep the body 
whole. It saddens the heart to see the bright boy 
and girl in whom you have placed your highest 
hopes, unable to get a chance to make good in the 
battle of life, because you have nothing wherewith 
to give them a start. 

Poverty grinds yon at every turn; yon cannot 
254 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

escape it, no matter how you try to dodge its pres- 
ence. You will never meet this grim spectre 
above, for he can never enter the gates of the 
shining land. You will get free from him there 
as did Lazarus, who waked up out of his rags, 
his miseries and disease to be clothed in the glo- 
rious raiment of the blessed, to enjoy happiness 
forever free from pain. 

All of Christ's poor can wake up at the last 
without any more of their disadvantages. There 
will be no rents to pay, for the heavenly mansions 
have been prepared for your coming since our 
Lord ascended into heaven. You will have no 
clothes to purchase, for divine hands have fash- 
ioned immortal robes for you that shall wear for- 
ever. There you will have no more food to pur- 
chase, for the granaries of the blessed are full to 
overflowing, and ' ' God shall supply all your need 
according to his riches of glory in Christ Jesus." 

Here on earth because you are poor, you may 
have to take a back seat in the church and you are 
almost afraid to lift your voice in the praise and 
worship of God, lest the sound might disturb some 
of your fashionable brethren, but in heaven all will 
worship in the temple of equality and the beggar 
and the millionaire unite in harmony in chanting 
the divine glory of their common Lord. 

255 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
No Sighs of Farewell 

There will be no pain of parting in the land 
above, no sorrow of leave-taking, no sighs of fare- 
well. Here we walk and talk and eat together, but 
after a while we must separate to go our different 
ways. The home circle is broken and our dear 
ones pass away. Death may claim a member, and 
how hard is it then for us to close those eyes into 
which we have gazed with the depths of love, a 
love which was reciprocated, to clasp the cold hand 
that now gives back no warm, answering pressure, 
to look for the last time on the beloved features ere 
they are shut off by the coffin lid. At such a time 
the heart overflows with woe, and you feel as 
though every nerve and fibre were being torn by 
red hot pincers, while the brain reels and you 
almost collapse under the load of anguish. 

At such a time even religion often fails to give 
consolation, but soon the agony passes and the 
blessed hope comes to comfort us that the one who 
has vanished from mortal vision is not lost, but 
gone before, to wait for and welcome you to the 
heavenly home, where the circle of love and kin- 
dred shall never be broken, where no death chill 
shall be felt, where no farewells shall be taken, 
but each shall live for each throughout the ages 
of eternity. 

256 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

No Sickness Yonder 
There will be no pain of body there, as there is 
here. This world is but a hospital, a lazaretto for 
the groans and weepings and diseases of humanity. 
Pain has gone through every street, up every lad- 
der, down every shaft, visited every home, has left 
no one immune from its touch, but with God it shall 
be felt no longer. There will be no malaria in the 
air, no contagion on the wayside. There will be 
no bruised feet treading the burning streets, no 
weary arms nor aching limbs, no painful respira- 
tion, no hectic flush on the cheek to tell of the rav- 
ages within. No, there shall be no more pain, and 
neither shall there be any more darkness. 

No Darkness There 

John tells us, "There shall be no night there." 
It will be an everlasting day, yet without the 
garish glare that wearies eye and brain. A soft 
glow shall encompass us with its mellow grandeur, 
the light proceeding from the throne, the holy of 
holies, the place of God himself. 

By informing us what we shall not find in heaven, 
the Bible opens for us a conception of the reality, 
"No curse, no pain, no tears, no sea, no night, no 
death." 

In heaven all mystery will be cleared away like 
mists before the sunbeams. Here we grope our 

257 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

way along like moles in the darkness nnable to 
penetrate the thick veil of mysteries which con- 
front ns on all sides. Here life is an enigma, a 
source of happiness at times, yet an arena of con- 
flict ; often a path of peace, still a road of difficulties 
from the cradle to the grave. 

Mysteries Revealed Yonder 

There are mysteries everywhere. The righteous 
are afflicted, the wicked prosper, innocence is 
blasted and vice is triumphant, purity is trampled 
in the dust, lust is put upon the throne, hon- 
esty is spurned and dishonesty taken by the 
hand, integrity fails and fraud wins, vice often 
reaches the top while virtue is thrust down to the 
bottom. 

Why this should be is all inexplicable to our poor 
finite understanding and limited capacity, but on 
the other side all will be made clear and we shall 
rejoice that it was as it was. There God will 
show us the "Why" and the "Wherefore" of his 
now inscrutable ways. In the eternal day all mys- 
teries will be made clear. We are now in the night 
of earth's ignorance; but when heaven's morning 
breaks, then shall earth's shadows flee away. And 
there shall be no night there. 

Night is a symbol of sorrow. During the silent 
258 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

watches of the night the memory of our deceased 
loved ones comes most vividly to ns. It is then 
we miss the grasp of the hand, the warm kiss and 
fond embrace. It is then the heart aches most in 
the angnish of sore bereavement, when we think of 
the past, and all it meant to ns ; the past when those 
we loved were around to comfort us by their pres- 
ence, cheer us with hopeful words, to encourage us 
with their smiles and lend a helping hand to assist - 
us up life's rugged way. 

No Tears in Heaven 

Night is the time to weep. Then no one can see 
the tears which fall upon our pillow, the bitter, sad 
tears of memory for those who are gone. Perhaps 
we have been unkind to them in erring moments, 
and caused them sorrows and worries and annoy- 
ances from which they would have been free but 
for our thoughtless words and hasty actions. Per- 
haps we made their burdens heavier instead of 
lighter ; took away whatever little sunshine was in 
their lives and cast gloom in its place. It may be 
a fond parent we have lost and wronged by our 
wayward courses by disobedience, by refusing to 
hearken to advice well meant. We may have caused 
the heart now stilled to grieve for our ingratitude 
and lack of honor and respect and love ; or it may 
be a fond brother or a clinging sister that suffered 

259 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

from our neglect and coldness, who, with their last 
dying* glance, looked us the forgiveness we did not 
deserve. All these memories now come rushing 
over the soul, flooding it with unavailing regrets ; 
now when it is too late to make recompense or 
remedy our blindness and folly. Yes, many a pil- 
low is moistened when the world cannot look on to 
see the repentance which comes too late to make 
atonement for the past. 

Let us think of this in time while those are 
with us whom we should love, and who are entitled 
to our respect and consideration. Let us so treat 
them that we may have no regrets in regard to 
them when they have passed from our earthly 
ken forever. 

It is at night in sweet dreams we are restored to 
the delightful companionship of our dead, but on 
awakening, the disillusion brings with it the heart- 
ache because the beloved ones are not present to 
speak to us in the old familiar tones, or turn to 
us with the genial smile and embrace us in the 
clasp of love. There will be no night of sorrow 
or sighing or weeping in heaven; no night of un- 
availing regret and impotent longings for the days 
and deeds that are past and done. Surely this 
gives us a blessed hope of a glorious future await- 
ing us in the nightless land of eternal day. 

260 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

No Night in Heaven 

No night shall be in heaven! No gathering gloom 
Shall o'er that glorious landscape ever come; 
No tears shall fall in sadness o'er those flowers 
That breathe their fragrance through celestial bowers. 

No night shall be in heaven! No dreadful hour 
Of mental darkness, or the tempter's power: 
Across those skies no envious cloud shall roll, 
To dim the sunlight of the raptured soul. 

No night shall be in heaven! No sorrow reign, 
No secret anguish, no corporeal pain, 
No shivering limbs, no burning fever there, 
No soul's eclipse, no winter of despair. 

No night shall be in heaven! but endless noon; 
No fast-declining sun, nor waning moon; 
But there the Lamb shall yield perpetual light, 
'Mid pastures green, and waters ever bright. 

No night shall be in heaven! No darkened room, 
No bed of death, nor silence of the tomb ; 
But breezes ever fresh with love and truth, 
Shall brace the frame with an immortal youth. 

No night shall be in heaven! But night is here! 
The night of sorrow and the night of fear; 
I mourn the ills that now my steps attend, 
And shrink from others that may yet impend. 

No night shall be in heaven! Oh, had I faith 
To rest in what the Faithful Witness saith, 
That faith should make these hideous phantoms flee, 
And leave no night, henceforth, on earth to me. 

How to Reach Heaven 

Men are accustomed to talk glibly of going to 
heaven in face of the fact that they lead such 
shameless lives of sin and fraud as to disgrace and 
embitter the earth. It seems that such people 
think it is easy to gain a passport to heaven, that 
a little death-bed repentance or a few thousand ill- 

261 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

gained dollars given to the canse of charity, will be 
all that is necessary to gain admission to the 
mansions above. 

Heaven, no doubt, is easy to gain, but the right 
course must be taken to make it easy. It is easy 
for a strong man to lift two hundred pounds, but 
if through dissipation and vile living the same 
man so abuses his body that his muscles become 
flaccid and his limbs weak, he will find the task 
an extremely difficult, if not an impossible one. 

If you want to go to heaven you must put your- 
self in condition. You must seek it here and go 
about the proper means. 

0, mean, greedy, avaricious, money-loving souls, 
you whose gaze, were you in heaven, would be ever 
on the trodden gold of its pavements; you base 
usurers and grinders of the poor, who defraud 
innocence of its birthright, whose path through 
life is wet with the tears of widows and orphans, 
what claim have you to heaven? Where are your 
credentials to its court? And you, slandering 
whisperers whose souls are murderous with hate 
and envy, why do you talk of heaven? What 
have such as you to do with the home where sin 
cannot enter or nothing defiled be seen? Apples 
of Sodom and clusters of Gomorrah cannot grow 
in the same soil with the Tree of Life, 

262 



WHAT IS HEAVEN AND HOW TO REACH IT 

Were it possible for you to enter heaven with 
yonr hard hearts unchanged, it would not be a 
heaven to you, but a hell, for every virtue there 
would be a burning reproach to you ; every rapture 
would be a burden ; every nobleness a shame ; you 
would fly within yourself and tremble at your own 
sordidness and meanness and soullessness and sin. 

You self-seeking men, whose only consideration 
is your own worldly advancement, who, to satisfy 
your unlawful ambitions, would drive the Jugger- 
naut of your greed over the bleeding, writhing 
bodies of your victims, don't talk of heaven until 
you have turned your hard hearts from the worship 
of the Moloch of Mammon to the worship of God, 
until you learn how to keep his laws and obey his 
commandments . 

But you can become what you are not, and be all 
that God meant you to be. ' ' Wash you, make you 
clean, put away the evils of your doings from 
before God's eyes, cease to do evil, learn to do 
well." 

Then you will begin to know what heaven is, and 
how it is gained, and this will give you a foretaste 
of its happiness, even amid the sorrows of earth. 

You will not need the aid of symbols, for you 
will think of heaven, not as some meadow of 
asphodel or plain of gold, but as a country of rest 

263 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

from the turmoils of life, surcease from the wick- 
edness and wretchedness of the world, a prepared 
place for a prepared people. 

Heaven a Continuity — A Development 

Heaven, so far as it is a place at all, must be a 
place where sin is not ; where purity and truth and 
honor reign triumphantly forever. 

To be honest, true, noble, sincere, genuine, pure, 
holy to the heart's innermost core, to have Christ 
in you, the hope of glory — this is heaven in the soul 
and the foretaste of the heaven hereafter. 

Heaven is not merely a reward, but a continuity ; 
not a change only, but a development. It is more 
than crystal waters and a golden city in the far- 
off blue. It is an extension, an undisturbed con- 
tinuance of the Christian life commenced on earth 
to be continued in the more congenial surroundings 
of the land beyond the river. 

Heaven means holiness, and holiness means 
wholeness, the wholeness of a life rounded out by 
the virtues which adorn humanity, by the service 
which is ever employed in the love of man and 
praise of God. Heaven is union with God, and with- 
out such union here on earth we cannot expect it in 
the hereafter ; but with such union here there must 
in the nature of the case be both union and God 
communion in the world to come. 

264 



What Shall We Do in Heaven? 



What is left for us, save in growth of soul to rise: 

From the gift looking to the Giver, 

And from the cistern to the river, 

And from the finite to Infinity, 

And from man's dust to God's Divinity? 

— Browning. 



Have we not all, and earth's petty strife, 

Some pure ideal of a noble life, 

That once seemed possible? did we not hear 

The flutter of its wings, and feel it near, 

And just within our reach? it was! — and yet 

We lost it in this daily jar and fret, 

And now live idle in a vain regret, 

But still our place is kept, and it will wait 

Ready for us to fill it, soon or late; 

No star is ever lost we once have seen, — 

We always may be what we might have been; 

Since good, though only thought has life and breath. 

God's life can always be redeemed from death; 

And evil, in its nature, is decay, 

And any hour can blot it all away; 

The hopes that lost in some far distance seem, 

May be the truer life — and this the dream. 

— Adelaide Procter. 



CHAPTER X 
What Shall We Do in Heaven ? 

Man's hopes and desires cross the boundary of 
time and penetrate into the illimitable fields of an 
infinite eternity — that which was, is, and ever 
shall be. 

Life is a part of this mysterious whole, and as 
such can have no end in itself. There is no death 
— all is but change. 

Longfellow cheerily sings : 

There is no death — what seems so is transition; 

This life of mortal breath 
Is but a suburb of the life elysian 

Whose portals we call Death. 

In the midst of death we can take up our harps 
and sing with Lytton : 

There is no death! The stars go down 

To rise upon some fairer shore; 
And bright in heaven's jeweled crown 

They shine forever more. 

There is no death! The dust we tread 

Shall change beneath the Summer showers 

To golden grain, or mellow fruit, 
Or rainbow tinted flowers. 

The granite rocks disorganize 

To feed the hungry moss they bear; 

The forest leaves drink daily life 
From out the viewless air. 

269 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

There is no death! The leaves may fall, 

And flowers fade and pass away; 
They only wait through wintry hours 

The coming of the May. 

There is no death! An angel form 

Walks o'er the earth with silent tread; 

We bear our best loved things away, 
And then we call them "dead." 

He leaves our hearts all desolate, 

He plucks our fairest, sweetest flowers; 

Transplanted into bliss, they now 
Adorn immortal bowers. 

The bird-like voice, whose joyous tones 
Made glad these scenes of sin and strife, 

Sings now an everlasting song 
Amid the trees of life. 

And where he sees a smile too bright, 
Or heart too pure for taint and vice, 

He bears it to that world of light, 
To dwell in Paradise. 

Born into that undying life, 

They leave us but to come again; 
With joy we welcome them, the same, 

Except in sin and pain. 

And ever near us, though unseen, 

The dear immortal spirits tread; 
For all the boundless Universe 

Is life — there is no death! 

God placed man here to give him opportunity 
for attaining expression and acquiring develop- 
ment in preparing for the life hereafter. 

Bishop Eandolph S. Foster, in his argument on 
the philosophy of the mind shows that: " Capac- 
ity implies an end equal to its measure. The princi- 
ple involved is, God does nothing needless. When 
he bestows a power it is that it may be improved. 

270 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

This is proved to be a fact throughout the entire 
circle of nature in every case, man excepted. No 
seed of any vegetable contains a latent force which 
may not find full expression in the condition of its 
earthly existence. Its bloom and fruit and stature 
may reach completeness. There remains in it no 
potentiality undeveloped. The same is true of 
every animal. Its earthly life furnishes it the full 
opportunity for perfect expression. There was 
the opportunity for their attaining their end. 
Were it to live to eternity it could become no more 
than it is in the hours or years, as the case may be, 
of its life. The evolution is perfect. Nature fur- 
nishes no instance of a power which is useless or 
thwarted. Blasted germs and premature decays 
are no contradiction of this principle. The earth 
furnishes to them the conditions for perfect ex- 
pression. That they were cut short does not imply 
the creation of capacity in vain, or to no end, since 
in many cases they reach the end, and the object of 
their creation is answered. Nor is their failure to 
come to complete development in any sense a 
calamity. There is no real waste in the case. 
Man furnishes the solitary exception of this law. 
He is the only argosy that, freighted with vastest 
wealth, is sent out upon the ocean of existence at 
most lavish expenditure, that it may be stranded 

271 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

upon the nearest reef, and its splendid jewelry be 
sunk in the infinite abyss. Why such expensive 
folly? To what end such waste? Why create 
such wealth of possibility and dash it to atoms in 
the instant of its creation? It is inconceivable 
that the Infinite should be guilty of such unthrift. 
The madness of such a deed is even greater than 
we have supposed. He does not even finish the 
work, but destroys it in the process of making — 
spoils the harvest in the bloom. He creates powers 
which expand as they age, which gain wealth as 
they are used, every exercise of which becomes a 
history, every forthputting an eternal psalm; — 
powers that retain all they ever gain, and advance 
toward the Infinite, a great soul of powers ; which 
at some time would pass angelic stature in wealth 
of wisdom and knowledge, and would become a 
universe of grandeur and happiness in itself; a 
soul which, with all its glory of being and felicity, 
would pour forth all its wealth in adoring worship 
of its author ; a soul whose bliss would almost rival 
his own ! Is it possible to imagine that the Infinite 
did create such a being, and open before himself 
and before it such a prospect and nourish it with 
the idea only that he might dash the beautiful 
vase and scatter all its incense in one mad 
moment ? ' 9 

272 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

If the sculptor should dash to pieces the finished 
conception of his genius; if the painter should 
rend the canvas on which he has almost duplicated 
life ; if the architect should tear down the dome he 
had erected with infinite pains, would we not look 
upon them as madmen incapable of realizing the 
insanity of their actions ? Since God is the expres- 
sion of all wisdom, he cannot do a foolish thing, 
and to make man to perish would indeed be the 
worst of all folly. 

If there is no future state for the working out 
of that moral completeness which the present 
never brings, then there can be but one solemn 
conclusion — that man is an absolute failure. But 
such an implication is an insult to Divine Intelli- 
gence, and the supposition falls to the ground. 

If God never wrote failure on any of his works, 
not even the least or the lowliest, can it be as- 
sumed that he will stamp it on the forehead of the 
most sublime creation of his Almighty wisdom, 
on man the noblest of all his handiwork, him 
whom he had made in his own image and likeness, 
on whom he had conferred a part of his own 
divine perfection, whom he had made master over 
the rest of created beings, in whose brain he has 
kindled the fires of intelligence and reason to guide 
his course to a fulfilment of the law, — man, who 

273 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

sits on the seats of the mighty and regulates mat- 
ter to his will, who proudly marches down the cor- 
ridors of time commanding the obedience of the 
rest of created life, who, in thought, wanders 
through the fields of space, with his God-given 
intelligence, naming and weighing the planets, 
telling when and where the wandering comets will 
appear, measuring the depths of the universe as 
with rule and line and forecasting the future 
movements of worlds with unerring accuracy? 
No! God has not written failure on the brow of 
man. Instead he has eternally stamped success. 

From the earliest dawn of the world, humanity 
has dwelt on the eternal and endeavored to pene- 
trate the veil of mystery that hangs between the 
finite and the infinite, between that which is known 
as time, and that which we call eternity. 

The ancient philosophers tried to solve the 
riddle of existence and peer into the future that 
lies beyond. Though chained down to earth by 
the ignorance of their primitive time and groping 
in the darkness of barbarism, some flashes of 
light now and again illumined their paths to point 
the way to an unseen world beyond. 

That grand old pagan, Socrates, caught fleeting 
glimpses of the great hereafter. He had a 
daemon by his side whispering into his ears the 

274 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

solution of the mystery of life. This was but his 
own sub-consciousness manifesting itself, assert- 
ing its attributes in a longing after the immortal 
and the unknown. 

That Socrates had a conception of the true Grod 
there can be little doubt, else why did he inculcate 
a godly course of living? He well knew that 
death does not end all, and when he drained the 
hemlock juice in his prison cell, the spirit within 
told him he was but shuffling off the mortal coil to 
enter upon a new existence. 

Plato, greatest of the old master's pupils, felt 
that earth was not the goal, nor time the boundary 
of the present life. He realized there was some- 
thing else to come, something to follow after, and 
he, too, manifested a belief in the being of a Su- 
preme Intelligence, governing the laws of matter. 

Aristotle, "father of philosophy, " embodies in 
his works perceptions and concepts which une- 
quivocally show that to him earth was but the step- 
ping stone to another sphere of existence, some 
other place of shadowy outlines enveloped in the 
mists of mystery. 

Indeed all the classic pagans of Greece and 
Eome, not to mention the seers of Oriental his- 
tory, subscribed to a belief in the immortality of 
man. 

275 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Cicero said: "When I consider the wonder- 
ful activity of the mind, so great a memory of what 
is past and such a capacity of penetrating into the 
future, when I behold such a number of arts and 
sciences and such a multitude of discoveries thence 
arising, I believe and am firmly persuaded that a 
nature which contains so many things within itself 
cannot be mortal." 

If man were mortal, if his goal were the inertia 
of clay, his heart would never throb with the 
desires of ambition, the fires of genius would 
never be kindled in his impassioned brain, to light 
the way to future achievements. 

Man's intellect alone establishes his claim to 
immortality. Who will say that the burning brain 
of Gladstone — the brain that directed the destinies 
of empires and kingdoms is now but a piece of 
matter, that the resounding voice, once heard 
around the world, is forever hushed, that his use- 
fulness is no more; that he is not as if he had 
never been, or rather that he has gone back into 
material elements which will never unite again to 
constitute the grand whole known as Gladstone? 
No ! a thousand times no ! Gladstone has but left 
the stage of existence to play a part on another. 
He has passed on to a higher and more useful 
place to take up his uncompleted course on earth 

276 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

and advance to the perfection of the Eternal. 

Shakespeare's words have swayed the souls of 
men for three hundred years — is he now but the 
memory of a name clinging to mortal minds, or 
has he gone forward to perfect the work he began 
on earth, not merely the work of writing dramas, 
but that of advancing to the moral perfection 
unrealizable on earth! That above all is the occu- 
pation hereafter, the realization of our ideals, an 
endless progress towards the essence of the divine. 

The body material confines the aspirations of 
the spirit and fetters them down to earth. It is 
only when these trammels can be thrown off by 
the loosening of the spirit that opportunity is 
afforded to realize them in a better sphere. Em- 
bodiment shuts in the grandest emotions of the 
soul, the noblest workings of the mind. Beethoven 
tells us that his sublime symphonies were but 
echoes of the heavenly music he heard in his 
dreams. 

Eaphael left his Sistine Madonna with disap- 
pointed heart. His work was merely an attempt 
to reproduce the vision of his mind ; its full glory 
he could not transfer to canvas. The spirit was 
fettered by the flesh. 

What poet ever fully uttered all his dreams, or 
set down his inspirations in the coldness of words ! 

277 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Did Homer, Virgil, Dante or Milton leave behind 
them, materialized in song, all the thoughts that 
surcharged their teeming brains and moved their 
impassioned souls 1 Surely they did not, for great 
as they were, the body clogged their faculties and 
kept them from expressing all. 

Does the philanthropist realize all his reforms ; 
does the statesman encompass all his schemes; 
does the inventor open every gate of discovery to 
unsuspected possibilities? No, one and all go 
down to the grave disappointed with hopes un- 
realized, ambitions unattained, desires unfulfilled, 
with something lacking, something missing to 
round out life and make it worth while to have 
lived. That is just it ; that is what thunderously 
proves the reality of an eternity, as a place to 
rectify the wrongs of earth, to supply its omis- 
sions, to bring its work to perfection and show 
that the earthly life was worth living in order to 
gain an entrance to the fulness of the' life ever- 
lasting. 

There can be no completeness here below. The 
present existence is but a preliminary to that 
which is to come. No man can encompass the 
work he would desire, not to speak of perfecting it. 

Humboldt, dying at ninety, feeling that he had 
just begun to study, exclaimed — "Oh, for another 

278 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

hundred years. ' ' Again lie said — ' ' I need a thou- 
sand years to do that which I now have in my 
mind. ' ' 

The greatest of seers and sages, no matter how 
long their time on earth, are taken away in the 
infancy of knowledge whose maturity can be de- 
veloped only in another state of existence. 

Sir Isaac Newton at the end of his sublime 
earthly career, said: "I feel like a child playing 
upon the seashore, picking up a pebble here and 
there, while the great ocean of truth lies unex- 
plored before me." 

Tennyson after giving the years of his compara- 
tively long life to poetry, expressed the wish that 
he might have one hundred more years for the 
study of music, then another hundred for art and 
similar periods to devote to the different sciences. 
Could his wish have been granted, he would have 
been dissatisfied with a thousand years, for his 
ambitions would still have been unrealized, and 
he would have passed on just as discontented. 
Without realizing it Tennyson was doing what 
every child of humanity has done from the begin- 
ning — he was longing for a realization, in another 
life, of the unattainable ideals of earth. 

Southey, dying, asked to be carried into his 
library, where he fondly handled his books, like 

279 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

a loving parent a dear child, and then sighed as 
he thought he mnst bid them farewell. 

The incompleteness of the earthly life calls for 
the immortality of the eternal to carry it on, not 
indeed in the same manner as on earth, but on a 
higher plane, where the soul united to the glorified 
body will form a union not shackled by the fetters 
of the flesh, but awake to divine influence, ever 
progressing onwards and upwards in the beauty 
of morality and the perfection of achievement. 

There will be time enough on the other side, 
and the years there will not overtake us and 
bring decrepitude of body or feebleness of mind. 
There will be no old age, no pain, no sickness, no 
cares, no worry, no struggle to carry on the func- 
tions. It will be a land of eternal youth, of ever- 
lasting sunshine, of never-ending joys and of end- 
less progress, and not a paradise of inactivity, a 
heaven of laziness where all will lie down and bask 
in the golden glory of burnished thrones and em- 
purpled canopies. 

The eye of reason and the ear of faith dispel the 
common notions regarding the home of the blessed 
as the ideal of the idler. It is time that the in- 
credulous, though popular, conceptions of heaven 
were corrected; the conceptions which picture it 
as a place of harp-tuning and mystical musical 

280 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

harmony, where the strings are being constantly 
swept by angel hands. How wonld the unmnsical 
fare in snch a place! What would the workers 
do who sighed for more to accomplish on earth f 
For the vast majority there would be no work 
to do. 

Idleness is the dread of the progressive. In 
such a state there can be no happiness ; therefore, 
the picture of the hereafter as an abode of sheer 
repose, of musing, dreaming ecstasy, wherein one 
falls into a coma of pleasing meditation from 
which he fain would not arouse to action, is repug- 
nant to the ideas and desires of all who would 
advance in the direction of increased knowledge 
and absolute perfection. 

The river comes from the ocean by the action of 
the sun's rays. To the ocean again it returns, but 
when it reaches there it does not remain a stag- 
nant mass of water, but keeps in motion, contribut- 
ing its share to the usefulness of the whole body. 
In the ocean of eternity there is no still water. 
All is ever in circulation, each drop performing 
its part and doing its share for the entire mass. 
There is perpetual motion, not an ebb and flood, 
but a constant flow, ever onwards in the direction 
of accomplishment. 

Though the Bible is not explicit as to the 
281 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

employments and enjoyments of heaven, enough 
is revealed to show that the common notions of 
never-ending rest and everlasting inactivity are 
but distorted views based on a false interpreta- 
tion of God's designs in regard to the destiny of 
his creatures. He created man for action on earth, 
to do something, to accomplish results. Why 
then should this activity be limited to earth where 
there is time for so little and be restricted in 
heaven where there is endless time for everything? 
The popular misconception of the hereafter as 
unending song probably arises from the frequency 
with which worship is introduced into the account 
which the Scriptures give of the celestial temple. 
There is, of course, something congenial to the 
imagination in the idea of an unbroken melody, 
one continuous Psalm rolling its wave-notes of 
song till silence in her farthest solitudes, listening, 
finds a voice and sends back the repeating echoes. 
But the conception of perpetual song, though most 
pleasing to the imagination, cannot satisfy the 
reason. Who does not enjoy a proficient choir, 
the sonorous notes of which rouse the soul on the 
wings of prayer to soar to the great white throne 
of the Eternal? But who wants to hear a choir 
all the time? Too much of anything becomes 
monotonous and clogs the senses with satiety. 

282 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

The Hallelujah chorus sounding in our ears all 
the time would become discordant to the tym- 
panum and wear upon the nerves. There must 
be both a variation and a recess. 

Praise and song must not be confounded. We 
can offer praise without the song, in active obe- 
dience, in faculties consecrated to the Creator's 
service, in conforming to his will in our actions. 

When we are admonished to pray always, it is 
not meant that we should constantly engage in a 
perpetual round of worship and adoration to the 
neglect of other duties. If "he prayeth best who 
loveth best," then we can best pray by attending 
to our business, doing the things required of us, 
and performing our parts faithfully in relation to 
ourselves and our Creator. The man digging a 
sewer may be giving more homage to God than the 
recluse in his cloister. Indeed he often is, for the 
digger is working for his kind, contributing his 
share to the sum total of human progress, while 
the recluse is only attending to his individual self. 

The idea that the redeemed are ever gazing on 
the face of the glorified Christ, arises from the 
prominence the New Testament gives to the God- 
man as the central figure of worship. It also owes 
much of its conception to our social nature. We 
are all given to what moderns call hero-worship. 

283 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

If an individual has occupied our thoughts and 
engaged our affections we are apt to become so 
absorbed with his personality, that when he is in 
our presence the eye is constantly fixed upon his 
features, studying every movement and taking in 
every outline of his figure. We treasure his 
words, and the accent of his speech is constantly 
in our ears. 

But does Christ elect to sit upon his throne as 
a mere object to be gazed at? Does he demand 
a constant adoration to the suppression of all 
other pursuits and desires! Is the Eedeemer so 
selfish as to abrogate to himself the universal 
homage of all, to the shutting out of every hope, 
the suppression of every emotion, the confinement 
of every aspiration of the soul? Is it not more 
reasonable to suppose that after the first trans- 
ports of the redeemed, he will give opportunity 
for gratitude to exert itself by some show of 
action, some employment of love that will mani- 
fest itself in service, by the doing of something 
that will meet with the approval and encourage- 
ment of him who, when upon earth, "went about 
doing good." 

A mere look will not satisfy. It must be accom- 
panied by a more tangible effort to reciprocate 
favors shown. Opportunity will be given to such 

284 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 
effort. On earth Christ exemplified the dignity 
of labor. He did not ask his followers to cast all 
their interests to the winds by neglecting their 
other duties for his sake. He preached to them 
of heavenly subjects after they had done their 
duty by earthly concerns. He did not believe in 
idleness. He never idled himself, but used every 
moment to advantage. He closed the door in the 
face of the indolent virgins who preferred sleep to 
duty. In heaven will he be different from that 
which he was on earth? Will he encourage sloth 
and laziness by doing nothing himself, while the 
redeemed loll on sapphire thrones and gaze upon 
his countenance? 

That heaven has been described as a place of 
rest arises also from a biblical misconception. 
Eest does not always imply inactivity. The rest 
spoken of in the Bible is based on the idea of that 
Sabbatic rest which, while excusing from the 
manual labor of the working day, did not exon- 
erate the people from performing their duties 
toward God and one another. 

The rest of heaven is not sheer repose, not an 
indolent reverie, not a slothful inactivity. It is a 
rest which means the absence of the weariness, 
sorrows, passions and pains of this world. 

In heaven there will be no mental, moral or 
285 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

spiritual infirmity. The glorified body will corre- 
spond to the perfect soul. Eesurrection means 
rejuvenation. In heaven "we shall be made 
equal to the angels," and the Bible picture of an 
angel is radiant youth. Our transfigured body 
shall be made unto Christ's resurrection and 
ascension body: "We shall be like him, for we 
shall see him as he is." Christ entered heaven 
at the age of thirty-three. Our perfect bodies 
shall have eternal youth, the great equipment for 
occupation there. 

The Significance of Scripture Symbols 

That heaven will be a place of endless enter- 
prise and eternal endeavor can be inferred from 
the symbols under which the Bible sets forth its 
activity and life. 

We have Isaiah's symbol of the temple. To the 
old prophet the temple was a fitting conception 
for a hive of activity. It took a whole tribe of 
his nation to make efficient the temple service, the 
choir alone requiring three thousand trained sing- 
ers. Therefore, the illustration stands for a busy 
throng, where all are engaged in active service. 

Though there will be continual employment and 
never-ceasing effort, there will be no weariness 
in heaven, for the body will be relieved from the 

286 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

weight of flesh that burdens it on earth, and the 
years will not be measured by the standard of 
time. Eternal youth shall set its seal on the brow 
of all with the stamp of a vigorous immortality. 
No pains, no sorrows, no worrying, no nerve- 
wrecking dread of evils to come shall crush the 
spirit down, but ever buoyant and free from all 
care and anxiety it shall soar to higher and higher 
efforts in eternal progression. 

What work can be accomplished in this limitless 
hereafter! There will be time enough for every- 
thing, for the attainment of every desire, the ful- 
filment of every ambition, the pursuit of every 
calling. There the heart will realize its fondest 
hopes. There the disappointments of earth shall 
be made good. There all shall be given opportu- 
nity to reach the highest development. 

Who can measure the results this endless expe- 
rience will bring forth; what masterpieces, what 
perfections, when the trammels of earth no longer 
bind the soul and confine the noblest instincts of 
expression? There the great ones of earth will 
have every chance to continue the life-work begun 
below and improve upon it through the countless 
ages. 

Without weariness of spirit and fatigue of body, 
nor hampered by limitations and hindrances, 

287 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Raphael can improve upon his Sistine Madonna. 
He has now seen the Christ mother, as she was 
and is, and can go on transferring her divine 
expression to his glowing canvas. 

Michel Angelo, now that he has looked on the 
majesty of God the Father and passed through 
the thunderings and lightnings of the great day 
that rends the veil of time, will be better able to 
picture the ' ' Last Judgment. ' ' He will find other 
fitting subjects for his chisel and his brush in the 
tremendous mysteries, now fully revealed, which 
surround him. 

Titian, Rembrandt, Turner and Hunt will have 
loftier faculties to portray the transfigured Christ, 
since instead of a conception they will have the 
reality as their model. 

Who will doubt that the old masters of music 
will still be engaged on their divine symphonies, 
creating harmonies of sound to blend with "the 
music of the spheres" in one grand diapason of 
celestial melody? 

Haydn can produce a better oratorio than 
"Creation," now that his eyes and ears have 
opened to the secrets of worlds. His earthly in- 
spiration came from heaven, so now that he has 
reached its source, he can drink deep draughts to 
refresh his soul and enable him to pour forth 

288 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

sublime strains of ravishing sweetness. Haydn 
himself said that music had its highest throne in 
heaven. This was before earth had passed away, 
but now that the harmony of worlds and the voices 
of millions have been added to the orchestra of 
cherubim and seraphim, to the choir of thrones, to 
the band of principalities and powers, the whole 
produces a symphony of sound rolling down the 
aisles of infinity, entrancing all with the gorgeous 
beauty of its notes. Mozart and Beethoven, 
Gounod and Liszt, Handel and Mendelssohn, 
Wagner and the other giants in the field of melody 
will have amplitude for boundless enthusiasm in 
their beloved art. 

Soldiers, sailors, statesmen, professional men 
of all kinds can follow the bent of earth to higher 
ideals. There will be other worlds to be saved, 
and there will be armies, but no blood-stained con- 
querors to trample over the defeated. All will be 
fighting on the side of right under the banner of 
the Supreme Commander. St. John in his Apoca- 
lyptic vision says: "The armies which are in 
heaven followed him on white horses. " 

Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, Napoleon and 
Grant will conquer rebellious worlds throughout, 
some part of God's dominions. They will again 
lead armies, and bloodlessly, painlessly demon- 

289 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

strate the triumphs of their splendid military 
genius. The illustrious navigators and admirals 
will sail celestial seas, the explorers finding new- 
lands of delight on every voyage. Magellan and 1 
Cook, Livingstone and Stanley will discover 
islands and continents of happiness where all 
bask in the sunshine of the Eternal. 

Mathematicians can figure to their soul's delight 
and no problem too difficult to solve will arise. 
The solution will be found in the exactitude of 
permutations and combinations in which there 
shall be no variant, no shifting cypher to baffle 
and to puzzle. Squares and angles shall fit with 
geometric precision into their complements. The 
circle shall at last be squared. Fluxions and the 
conic sections, the differential and integral cal- 
culus will lay bare their secrets with logarithmic 
accuracy to the last decimal. The infinity of 
numbers will be measured and the location of the 
vanishing point be determined. 

Space will no longer have any more terrors for 
the astronomer, for planets, worlds and systems 
shall be merged in the mighty whole called heaven, 
the boundary of which is infinity, and the end but 
the beginning — the beginning of eternity. 

The mind will no longer be hedged in by the 
grossness of matter, but will be able to penetrate 

290 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

to tlie "uttermost depths and fathom the abysses 
of all knowledge. 

Plato wrote above his door, "Let none enter 
here who is not acquainted with geometry." He 
will have no canse to complain in his new abode, 
for around him he will find all have explored the 
fields of geometrical science. 

Euclid will be able to demonstrate higher 
problems and put forward sublimer theories; 
Pythagoras will no longer have to sacrifice his 
oxen to the muses at the joy of discovering new 
solutions, for the key that unlocks all solutions 
shall be ready to his hand to unlock the gates of 
knowledge and let him roam wherever he listeth 
in its boundless domain. 

Phidias and Praxiteles will think lightly of 
their boasted sculptures of earth when they shall 
have for models the columns and statuary of 
angelic hands. How crude and insignificant will 
a Venus de Milo, or a Venus de Medici be in com- 
parison with the perfection of carving according 
to divine designs'? What will be the dimensions 
of a Colossus of Ehodes in magnitude to the gorge- 
ous temples and massive columns formed from 
porphyry and onyx and hammered gold ! 

The works of man on earth are trivial, puny, 
infinitesimal almost, because they are of time, per- 

291 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

ishable and mortal, while those of heaven are 
majestic, sublime, immense, since they are imper- 
ishable, immortal, fashioned for time everlasting, 
for the eternity that shall have no end. 

Christ's symbol of heaven is a home. There 
are "many mansions there.' ' Home is indicative 
of work and progress, a place where the inmates 
unite for a common cause and share one another's 
pleasures, exult in one another's success. Thrift 
is taught as a virtue, idleness condemned as a vice. 
All are trying to go up, not down, constantly 
seeking the knowledge that will help them in the 
ascents of life. In the heavenly home all will be 
brethren, partakers of the universal happiness, 
glorying in mutual triumphs and assisting one 
another upward and onward in the scale of divine 
perfection. 

As there "are many mansions," there are also 
many stages and degrees of merit in the heavenly 
hereafter. "God giveth to each seed a body of 
its own." Those who have not deserved high 
places here by their course of action cannot hope 
to receive or win them hereafter, nor can it be 
expected that the careless and the indolent will 
be put on a plane with the painstaking and active. 
Here below we see many steps in the social ladder. 
One man surpasses his fellows in the ascent by his 

292 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

agility. Some, however, never get within reason- 
able distance of the top, they being too slow, or 
too careless rather, to exert themselves. 

We often see one brother of the same family far 
outdistancing his kindred in the life-race and 
coming to the goal a winner, taken by the hand by 
the mightiest ones of earth and greeted with the 
plandits of the multitude, while his shiftless kins- 
man goes down to the grave almost unknown, of 
no benefit to himself or to the world through which 
he has aimlessly passed. 

There will be disparity in the celestial state as 
in the earthly. Of course it sometimes, indeed 
often, happens on earth that merit is not rewarded, 
that all do not get their just deserts, but there 
will be no undeserved rewards, no crowns for 
those not entitled to them by love and service. 

Heaven is the hall of eternal justice, where each 
one is treated according to his deserts ; where is 
meted out to him that to which he is entitled. Of 
course the lowliest in heaven will progress, but 
such progression will not be in ratio to that of 
the more deserving who have entered higher 
spheres. On earth an abject state of misery, of 
want, of sinfulness, is apt to excite our pity and 
cause us sorrow ; but in heaven it will be different, 
for it will be felt that each one is in his proper 

293 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

place, put there by a Divine Intelligence, im- 
mutable in his justice. So there will be no com- 
plaining, no sighs, no tears, no regrets, but every- 
one will dwell in a society where envy does not 
enter, where jealousy has no place, where a uni- 
versal bond unites all, no matter how different the 
degree of position, into an indissoluble compan- 
ionship. 

John in his Apocalypse symbolizes heaven as a 
great city. What does a great city imply! A 
crowded hive of industry, of ceaseless activity, 
composed of all kinds and classes of people, a mul- 
titude working together for a common welfare. 
A city betokens bustling, active life with no shirk- 
ing of duty, a continual endeavor with no cessa- 
tion, for there is ever a demand for service, ever a 
requirement of necessities. Work engrosses every- 
thing, and claims every attention. 

Work will also be the order of heaven, but it 
will not entail the same servitude as on earth, 
for there will be infinitely more capacity for its 
performance. There the great Work-giver will 
assign it commensurately to the degrees of quali- 
fication it necessitates. A weakling cannot ac- 
complish as much as a robust man, neither can a 
weak soul consummate the labors of one who has 
attained to a high perfection. And the work will 

294 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

be measured not only by capacity, but will be of 
the kind congenial to the worker. All will carry 
on the earthly labors towards an eternal fulfil- 
ment. Homer will not be put to carrying bricks, 
nor will Dante be asked to wield a pick and shovel. 
Both will be given a golden stylus to jot down the 
impressions of the realm of thought. Milton will 
cull the flowers from the sides of the heavenly Par- 
nassus and weave them into garlands and bouquets 
of the richest intellectual beauty. Old John 
Bunyan, with his youth renewed, will write alle- 
gories of celestial wisdom whispered into his ears 
by angelic tongues. 

Luther and Calvin, Knox and Wesley will no 
longer wrangle about warring creeds, but will 
unite with Thomas a Kempis and Ignatius Loyola 
in singing the praises of the divine Master. 

The object of the work of all will be an expres- 
sion of love and worship and adoration of the great 
Creator. Each will have his apportioned place 
no matter what his eternal work may be. Some 
will act as ministers to carry out God's command- 
ments through his universal kingdom; others will 
be chosen as minstrels to everlastingly sound his 
praise, and many will be employed as messengers 
to go on his behests. "His servants shall serve 
him." 

295 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Abraham was commissioned to embosom Lazarus 
and exercise a fatherly care over the new-comer. 
Moses and Elijah came all the way from heaven 
to earth on the Lord's errand. 

The angels work. They blow the trumpets of 
judgment and hurl the thunderbolts. Gabriel 
brought God's word to Daniel and Zacharias and 
Mary. What a full and broad, grand and stirring 
life awaits us beyond! No wonder Paul said, 
"For me to die is gain." We shall not only live 
with, but for our friends who have passed on. 
Little wonder that with such a view of heaven, 
Paul, when in middle life, with all his faculties at 
their best, and his vitality at high tide, saidi "I 
have a desire to depart and be with Christ which 
is far better.' ' 

The work in heaven will be accompanied by 
worship. This worship will partake of praise and 
have expression in the psalmody of the voice and 
the harmony evoked from sounding instruments. 
Though the music will be choral, a unison from 
the tongues of all, we may suppose that sometimes 
an individual minstrel will raise his single voice 
in a solo of song, some David among the gifted 
ones, to whose ravishing melody angel ears will 
be glad to listen. 

Prayer, at least in some of its forms will con- 
296 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

stitute a part of the heavenly worship. There 
will be an adoration finding vent in oral expres- 
sion of thanksgiving. There will be no confes- 
sion, since there will be no sins to confess. The 
stains of earth have been washed away leaving 
the soul immaculate to reunite with the glorified 
body. The transgressions shall all be forgiven in 
the universal absolution for the penitent believer. 

There may be occasion for petition, for though 
each will be satisfied with his state, inasmuch as 
it is God-assigned, nevertheless the longing after 
loftier perfection will impel an asking of favors, 
and we may be sure that the loving Father will be 
pleased to hearken to the requests of his children, 
and even anticipate their wishes. If only for the 
luxury of asking there will doubtless be many 
requests, and whether the desire be expressed in 
audible words, or by look or sign exhibited to the 
eye of God alone it matters not; in either case it 
will be prayer. 

An important branch of the occupations of the 
redeemed will be the study of Providence. In 
heaven the mysteries of the present life will be 
solved, and the darkness will be dissipated. 

"That dark and freezing cloud, which now 
casts its shadow on our heart, and which we can- 
not understand, will then be seen to have had its 

297 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

mission. That stroke which smote down our first- 
born and fairest will then be seen to have had a 
meaning, and that blow which we cannot now think 
of without shedding tears of bitterness, will then 
be seen to have been but the touch of a Father who 
loved — a stroke inflicted by the hand that was 
nailed to the cross for us. That labyrinth, now 
inexplicable to us, that mystery now unfathom- 
able, those dealings of Providence which we can- 
not now comprehend, will then be seen distinctly 
by us to have an aim and a bearing which shall 
awaken in us new songs of gratitude, and inspire 
us with deeper thankfulness to him, who led us all 
the way through the wilderness, and placed us in 
the heavenly Canaan. Then shall we see that 'all 
things have been working together for our good'; 
that the darkest cloud had ever a smiling face 
behind it, and that the bitterest cup had in it a 
secret sweet. The great chain of mystery will 
then be lifted above the stream ; every link will be 
luminous, and we shall be convinced in glory of 
what we so much doubted and disbelieved on 
earth — viz., that we received not one stripe too 
many, endured not one pang too severe, were sub- 
jected to not one visitation that was not as essen- 
tial to our ultimate happiness, as that Christ 
should have died on the cross, and washed and 

298 



WHAT SHALL WE DO IN HEAVEN? 

sealed us with his own most precious blood.' ' 
God grant this future in the long hereafter may 
be ours — where we shall begin to plan and work 
forever; where we shall listen to sweeter music 
than we have heard here, know deeper joys than 
we have ever experienced, learn profounder truths 
than we ever dreamed of, live in a holier love and 
in the clear light of endless glory see God not 
"though a glass darkly," not by reflected rays 
from his works and word, but "face to face," by 
open vision, standing in his presence and gazing 
on his countenance, the mind possessing the pow- 
ers of the eye, so that the understanding shall 
gather in the magnificence of truth with the same 
facility as the organ of sense gathers the beauties 
of the landscape. Then "shall we know even as 
also we are known. ' ' 



Shall We Know Each Other There ? 



We are quite sure 

That He will give them back, 

Bright, pure and beautiful; 

We know that He will but keep 

Our own and His until we fall asleep; 

We know that He does not mean 

To break the strands reaching between 

The here and there; 

He does not mean, though heaven be fair, 

To change the spirits entering there, 

That they forget. — Anon, 



If yon bright stars which gem the night, 

Be each a blissful dwelling sphere, 
Where kindred spirits reunite, 

Whom death has torn asunder here, 
How sweet it were at once to die, 

To leave this blighted orb afar; 
'Twixt soul and soul to cleave the sky 

And soar away from star to star. 

But oh ! how dark, and drear and lone, 

Would seem the brightest world of bliss, 
If wandering through each radiant one, 

We fail to find the loved of this! 
If there no more, the ties shall twine 

Which death's cold hand alone could sever, 
Alas, those tears in mockery shine, 

More hateful as they shine forever! 

It cannot be — each hope — each fear, 

That lights the eyes or clouds the brow, 
Proclaims there is a happier sphere, 

Than this cold world that holds us now. 
There is a voice which sorrow hears, 

When heaviest weighs life's galling chain, 
'Tis Heaven that whispers — dry your tears, 

The pure in heart shall meet again. 

— William Leggett. 



CHAPTER XI 

Shall We Know Each Other There ? 

You naturally want me to answer Yes ! and your 
heart's cry for that answer is a strong presump- 
tion in its favor. Immortality as believed by 
Christians demands the heavenly recognition to 
make it of any real comfort. 

Now, what are the arguments in its favor? It 
is a doctrine which has been the object of almost 
universal faith. All kindreds of the earth have 
held it in both the ancient and modern world, and 
a universally received tenet is generally acknowl- 
edged to be an unquestionable truth, for the utter- 
ances of our common natures are not wont to 
deceive, and those feelings which are universally 
experienced are not false. 

To suppose that universal intelligence can al- 
ways and everywhere be hoodwinked by any cun- 
ningly devised fable is to destroy the value of 
intelligence itself. It is a fundamental dictate of 
reason and common sense, that all men cannot be 
deceived; therefore, heavenly recognition is a 
reality. 

305 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Heavenly Recognition Among the Greeks 
and Romans 

In the eleventh book of Odyssey, Homer repre- 
sents Ulysses as visiting the shades of death. He 
sees his mother and hastens to embrace her, but 
she vanishes as a dream before him — he being still 
in the flesh — while he exclaims in true tenderness 
and affection : 

Fliest thou, loved shade, while I thus fondly mourn! 
Turn to my arms; to my embraces turn! 
Is it, ye powers, that smile at human harms, 
Too great a bliss to weep within her arms! 

We are told that many of the lower orders 
among the ancients committed suicide, in the fit 
of sorrow caused by the death of their friends, in 
order the sooner to be with them again upon 
immortal shores. Socrates refers to this fact. 
"Are there not numbers," says he, "who upon 
the death of their lovers, wives, children, have 
chosen of their own accord to enter Hades, induced 
by the hope of seeing there those they loved, and 
of living with them again V 9 This custom, and 
the intention of it, are hinted at by Homer in his 
Iliad, Book XXIII, line 211, where Achilles is 
said to sacrifice four horses, two dogs and twelve 
human beings, in connection with the funeral 
honors of Patroclus, "selected to attend their 
lord:" 

306 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

Four sprightly coursers, with a deadly groan, 
Pour forth their lives, and on the pyre are thrown: 
Of nine large dogs, domestic at his board, 
Fall two, selected to attend their lord; 
When last of all, and horrible to tell, 
Sad sacrifice! twelve Trojan captives fell! 

What does this custom teach if not the belief 
that earthly attachments are perpetual beyond 
the grave? 

• So, also, we find Sophocles, in his Antigone, rep- 
resenting that ill-fated woman, when about to 
endure a cruel death, exclaiming : 

Oh, my deep dungeon! my eternal home! 
Whither I go to join my kindred dead; 
But still I have great hopes I shall not go 
Unwelcomed to my father, nor to thee, 
My mother! Dear to thee, Eteocles, 
Still shall I ever be. 

^Eschylus, in his Persea, represents the soul of 
Darius as still possessing the thoughts and feel- 
ings of his former life, and, in the address which 
he delivers, this departed spirit is exhibited as 
retaining a perfect recollection of his earthly 
history. 

We find Socrates, in his apology before the 
judges, thus bearing testimony to the doctrine of 
mutual recognition and companionship in the life 
to come : 

"Who would not part with a great deal to pur- 
chase a meeting with Orpheus, Hesiod and Homer? 
If it be true that this is to be the consequence of 

307 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

death, I would even be glad to die often. What 
pleasure will it give to live with Palmedes and 
others, who suffered unjustly, and to compare my 
fate with theirs? What an inconceivable happi- 
ness will it be to converse, in another world, with 
Sisyphus, Ulysses, etc., especially as those who 
inhabit that world shall die no more." 

Not only do we find this doctrine among the 
refined philosophers and poets of Greece, but like- 
wise among the polite and polished Komans. 
Cicero has left us his hopes in these touching 
words : 

"For my own part, I feel myself transported 
with the most ardent impatience to join the society 
of my two departed friends, your illustrious 
fathers, whose characters I greatly respected, 
and whose persons I sincerely loved. Nor is this, 
my earnest desire, confined alone to those excellent 
persons with whom I was formerly connected. 
I ardently wish to visit also those celebrated 
worthies, of whose honorable conduct I have 
heard and read much, whose virtues I have 
myself commemorated in some of my writings. 
To this glorious assembly I am speedily advan- 
cing; and I would not be turned back in my jour- 
ney, even on the assured condition that my youth, 
like that of Pelias, should again be restored." 

308 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

"0 glorious day! when I shall retire from this 
low and sordid scene, to associate with the divine 
assembly of departed spirits; and not only with 
those whom I have just now mentioned, but with 
my dear Cato, that best of sons and most valuable 
of men ! It was my sad fate to lay his body on the 
funeral pile, when by the course of nature I had 
reason to hope he would have performed the same 
last office to mine. His soul, however, did not 
desert me, but still looked back on me in its flight 
to those happy mansions, to which he was assured 
I should one day follow him. If I seemed to bear 
his death with fortitude, it was by no means that 
I did not most sensibly feel the loss I had sus- 
tained; it was because I supported myself with 
the consoling reflection that we should not long be 
separated." 

Virgil, in the sixth book of his great Epic, 
describes iEneas as visiting the realms of the 
departed and there recognizing and being recog- 
nized by the spirits he met. 

The various persons he had known on earth are 
seen by the Trojan hero. He represents the Sibyl 
as conducting iEneas through the shades below. 
As he passed along among them 

He saw friends, who, whelmed beneath the waves, 
Their funeral honors claimed, and asked their graves, 
The lost Leneaspis in the crowd he knew, 

309 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Whom, on the Tyrrhne seas, the tempest met, 

The sailors mastered and the ship o'erset, 

Amid the spirits Palinurus pressed, 

Yet fresh from life, a new admitted guest, 

Who, while he steering viewed the stars, and bore 

His course from Afric to the Latian shore', 

Fell headlong down. The Trojan fixed his view, 

And scarcely through the gloom the sullen shadows kneW» 

He saw also others, whom he had known on 
earth. Passing on, he came to the "mournful 
fields/ ' a place so called because it was the seques- 
tered and quiet abode of those who were crossed in 
love, and who had pined away and died under the 
blight of unrequited affection. 

In all his representations he speaks of those 
whom he meets in the shades after their station 
and manner of life here upon earth. Even the 
kind of death they died is often alluded to. Dido 
is not only addressed as a queen, but is also 
pictured as standing before him, fresh from 
her wounds, her snowy bosom bathed in 
blood. 

In like manner, Deiphobus, the son of Priam, 
is seen covered with wounds, and despoiled of 
his lamb. 

The following quotation affords a fine specimen 
of the ready manner in which he recognized his 
friends, and how similar their intercourse was 
to what they had been accustomed to in this 
world : 

310 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

He with his guide, the farther fields attained, 

Where, severed from the rest, the warriors' souls remained, 

Fidens he met, with Meleager's race, 

The pride of armies, and the soldier's grace; 

The pale Adrastus, with his ghastly face. 

Of Trojan chiefs he viewed a numerous train, 

All much lamented, all in battle slain — 

Glaucus and Mendon, high above the rest, 

Atenor's sons, and Ceres' sacred priest, 

The proud Idaeus, Priam's charioteer, 

Who shakes his empty reins, and aims his airy spear. 

The gladsome ghosts in circling troupes attend, . 

And with unwearied eyes behold their friend: 

Delight to hover near, and long to know 

What business brought him to the realms below. 

Virgil also represents immediate recognition as 
taking place with eqnal ease in the highest heaven, 
as in the lower and more sober Hades. Passing 
on through gloomy and cheerless shades, the region 
of those who are only partially blest, they enter at 
length the "verdant fields" of the higher and 
higher regions. Here, too, he recognizes those he 
knew upon earth : 

Here found they Teucer's old heroic race, 

Born better times, and happier years of grace 

Assaracus and Ilus here enjoy 

Perpetual fame, with him who founded Troy. 

Still he is not satisfied. There are ties of kin- 
dred, too, and he feels himself pressed in heart to 
seek his relatives. He longs especially to see his 
father Anchesis! The Sibyl makes inquiry of 
sacred priests and poets for the venerable hero. 
Kindly directed by these, they go through "bliss- 
ful meadows," and find him at last in a flowery 

311 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

vale, viewing, with a kind of holy pride, his race 
of illustrious descendants, as they pass in review 
before him. At once old Anchesis discovers his 
son ! The scene is tender and moving ! The sire 
sees ^Eneas coming, and 

Meets him with open arms and falling tears. 

Welcome, he said, the gods' undoubted race, 

Oh long expected to my dear embrace! 
Tis true, computing time, I now believed 
The happy day approached — nor are my hopes deceived. 

This rapture of meeting is warmly and affec- 
tionately reciprocated by his son. Is it not 
exactly what we feel to be natural, when, after a 
long separation we meet our friends in realms of 
bliss? .iEneas exclaims with holy joy: 

Reach forth your hand, oh parent shade, not shun 
The dear embraces of your loving son! 
He said; and falling tears his face bedew: 
Then thrice around his neck his arms he threw! 

Thus we find that the poets and philosophers of 
both Greece and Kome comforted themselves with 
the hope of recognition and reunion after death. 
They endured the short separation from their 
friends in the patience of hope. They suffered not 
death to break the ties which joined them to their 
friends. They loved the dead even as the living ; 
yea, sometimes more — even to deification. They 
cherished their memories, praised their virtues, 
forgot their failings and waited in the holy long- 

312 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

ing of warm affection to meet them again in the 
vale of Tempe, in the Hesperian Gardens, the 
Elysian Fields, or in the peaceful Islands of the 
Blest, in far-off and quiet seas. 

Modern Heathen Beliefs 

But a belief in future recognition has not been 
confined to the ancient pagans. The Heathen in 
modern times hold the same doctrine. Thus Dr. 
Robertson, in his history of America, informs us 
that, in some places, "upon the death of a Cazique, 
or American chief, a certain number of his wives, 
of his favorites and of his slaves were put to 
death, and interred with him, that he might appear 
with the same dignity in his future station, and be 
waited upon by the same attendants as formerly, 
and that many of the deceased person's retainers 
offered themselves as voluntary victims, and 
courted the privilege of accompanying their 
deceased master as a high distinction. ' ' 

The burning of Hindu widows was founded 
on a similar belief. We are told that "the 
officiating Brahmin causes the widow to repeat 
the formulas in which she prays that, as long as 
fourteen Indrus ' reign, or as many years as there 
are hairs on her head, she may abide in heaven 
with her husband." 

313 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Porphyry tells us that the Indian Gymnoso- 
phists, or barefooted philosophers, were wont to 
send messages to their departed friends with 
those who were about to commit snicide. 

The natives of Dahomey, too, entertained the 
same belief; and it was a common practice of the 
king of that country to send to his forefathers an 
account of any remarkable event. He did this by 
delivering the message to the person who was 
nearest to him at the time, and then ordered his 
head chopped off immediately, so that he might 
serve as a courier to convey the intelligence to his 
friends in the land of spirits. 

In Guinea when a king died many were slain, 
that they might again live with him in another 
world. In 1710, when the prince of Morava, on the 
coast of Coromandel, died, forty-seven of his 
wives were burned with his corpse so that they 
might associate with their husband in the next 
life. Similar customs have been found among 
other nations and tribes, all which, though defiled 
by superstition and sunk in cruelty, betoken the 
aspirations of the human spirit, and prove that 
humanity, even in its most degraded phases, still 
retains the purest of its social affections and longs 
for everlasting fellowship with the loved ones who 

have gone before. 

314 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

Pope has clothed the American Indian's hope in 
its most attractive garb : 

Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutored mind 
Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind : 
His soul proud science never taught to stray- 
Far as the solar walk, or milky way; 
Yet simple nature to his hope has given, 
Behind the cloud topp'd hill, an humbler heaven; 
Some safer world in depth of woods embraced, 
Some happier island in the watery waste, 
Where slaves once more their native land behold, 
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold; 
To be, content his natural desire, 
He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire; 
But thinks admitted to that equal sky, 
His faithful dog shall bear him company. 

No Distinction of Creed 

Cardinal Newman, the Eoman Catholic, in his 
Lead Kindly Light, talks abont the time when 

The night is gone 
And in the morn those angel faces smile 
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile. 

John Fawcett, the Baptist, in his Blest he the 
tie that binds, sings for ns — 

When we asunder part, 

It gives us inward pain; 
But we shall still be joined in heart 

And hope to meet again. 

From sorrow, toil and pain, 

And sin shall be free, 
And perfect love and friendship reign 

Through all eternity. 

Bonar, the Presbyterian, sings of the land — 

Where none shall beckon us away, 
Nor bid our festival be done; 
Our meeting time the eternal day, 
Our meeting place the eternal throne. 

315 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Then hand in hand firm linked at last 
And heart enfolded all, 
We'll smile upon the troubled past 
And wonder why we wept at all. 

Muhlenberg, the Episcopal, lifting his gaze to 
that heavenly country, exultantly sings : 

There the saints of all ages in harmony meet, 
Their Saviour and kindred transported to greet, 
Where anthems of rapture unceasingly roll, 
And the smile of the Lord is the feast of the soul. 

And Charles Wesley, the Methodist, sings for 
us and with us : 

Come, let us join our friends above 

That have obtained the prize, 
And on the eagle wings of love 

To joys celestial rise. 
One family we dwell in Him, 
One church above, beneath, 
Though now divided by the stream, 
The narrow stream of death. 

One army of the living God, 

To His command we bow. 
Part of his host have crossed the flood, 

And part are crossing now. 
O, that we now might grasp our Guide! 
O, that the word were given! 
Come, Lord of hosts, the waves divide, 
And land us all in heaven! 

The Heavenly Recognition Among the Primitive 
Christians 

To bury their dead decently the early Christians 
considered a religious duty. In the early church, 
the Christians often exposed themselves to the 
greatest danger to get the bodies of the martyrs 
out of the hands of their persecutors, that they 

316 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

might be decently buried. According to the testi- 
mony of Tertullian, collections, which were de- 
voted to the bnrial of the poor, were held in the 
church. To bnry the poor and strangers, was 
regarded as the last and greatest duty of love. 
This was a peculiarity, which was so strikingly 
prominent as to attract the attention of Julian the 
Apostate; and it was even by him much admired 
and commended. Even at night they repaired to 
the places where the bodies of their departed were 
interred. They thus tried to realize a secret and 
invisible communion with the beloved dead. They 
not only cherished the hope of being restored to 
them, but this continued communion with the loved 
ones gone before often generated a strong desire 
for death. 

The early Christians had a holy horror of the 
practice of burning the bodies of the dead, which 
was the custom prevailing at the time in the 
Eoman Empire. Beyond all reasonable doubt it 
was the doctrine of the resurrection of the body, 
and the belief in the perpetuation of its identity 
in another life, where it might again be recognized 
and known, which inspired them with disgust for 
a practice which seemed to indicate the belief that 
hope ought in no way to cling to those lifeless 
remains. Their tender and hopeful affection is 

317 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

beautifully seen in the conduct of the congrega- 
tion of Smyrna in reference to the body of Poly- 
carp, their bishop, after he had suffered martyr- 
dom. "We gathered up his bones,' ' was their 
affecting language, "which are more precious 
than gold and jewels, and deposited them in a 
suitable place ; and God will grant us to assemble 
there in joy and festivity, and celebrate the birth- 
day of his martyrdom, in remembrance of the 
departed champion, and for the purpose of excit- 
ing and arming those whom the conflict is still 
awaiting. ' ' — Neander. 

Hence they loved to have their burying places 
around their churches, so that it might be seen that 
the congregation of the dead was still united to the 
congregation of the living. Neander, too, informs 
us that the anniversary of the death of their 
friends was observed as a birthday to a nobler 
existence; that on this day "it was usual to 
partake of the supper of the Lord, in the con- 
sciousness of an inseparable communion of those 
who died in Christ;" and, he adds, "a gift was 
laid on the altar in their name, as if they were 
still living members of the church. ' ' 

The same eminent historian tells us, that, when 
multitudes were swept away at Carthage by a 
desolating pestilence, Cyprian said to his church 

318 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

"We ought not to mourn for those who, by the 
summons of the Lord, are delivered from the 
world, since we know they are not lost, but sent 
before us, that they have only taken their leave 
of us, in order to precede us. We may long for 
them as we do for those who are on a distant 
voyage, but not lament them. Why do we not 
ourselves wish to depart out of the world, or why 
do we mourn our departed ones as lost! Why do 
we not hasten to see our country, to greet our par- 
ents? There awaits us a vast multitude of dear 
ones — fathers, mothers and children — who are 
already secure of their own salvation, and anxious 
only for ours. What a mutual joy to them and us 
when we shall come into their presence and 
embrace. ' ' 

WTien in the third century a similar catas- 
trophe occurred — Cyprian said to his church: 

"Ye ought not to mourn for those who are deliv- 
ered from the world by the call of the Lord, since 
we know that they are not lost, but sent before 
us ; that they have taken their leave of us in order 
to precede us. We may long after them as we 
do after those who have sailed on a long voyage, 
but not lament them. We may not here below 
put on dark robes of mourning, when they above 
have already put on white robes of glory ; we may 

319 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

not give the heathen any just occasion to accuse 
us of weeping for those as lost and extinct, of 
whom we say that they live in God, and of failing 
to prove by the witness of our hearts the faith we 
confess with our lips. We who live in hope, who 
believe in God, and trust that Christ has suffered 
for us and risen again; we, who abide in Christ, 
who through him and in him rise again — why do 
we not ourselves wish to depart out of the world? 
— or why do we lament for the friends who have 
been separated from us, as if they were lost?" 
Neander's History of the Church, vol. i., pages 
333, 334. 

At the close of his sermon on immortality, 
Cyprian breaks out in a touchingly beautiful pas- 
sage, directly on the subject of the heavenly 
recognition : 

' ' Precious to us will be the day that shall assign 
to each of us our place of abode, that shall remove 
us hence and shall release us from the snares of 
earth, and bring us to Paradise in the heavenly 
kingdom. Who, finding himself in a strange 
country, does not earnestly desire to return to 
his Fatherland? Who, about to sail in haste for 
his home and his friends across the sea, does not 
long for a friendly wind, that he may the sooner 
throw his arms around his beloved ones? We 

320 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

believe Paradise to be our Fatherland; our par- 
ents are the patriarchs ; why should we not hasten 
and see our home and greet our parents 1 A great 
host of beloved friends awaits us there ; a numer- 
ous and varied crowd of parents, brethren, chil- 
dren, who are secure in a blessed immortality, and 
only still concerned for us, are looking for our 
arrival. To see and embrace these — what a mutual 
joy will this be to us and them ! What bliss, with- 
out the fear of death, to live eternally in the 
heavenly kingdom! How vast, and of eternal 
duration, is our celestial blessedness ! There is 
the glorious choir of the apostles — there the host 
of joyful prophets — there the innumerable com- 
pany of the martyrs, crowned on account of their 
victory in the conflict of suffering. There in 
triumph are the pure virgins. There the merciful, 
who have fed and blessed the poor, and, according 
to their Lord's directions, have exchanged earthly 
for heavenly treasures, now receive their glorious 
reward. To these, dearly beloved brethren, let us 
hasten with strong desire, and ardently wish soon 
to be with them, and with Christ. ' ' 

St. Ambrose, who flourished in the third cen- 
tury, in a funeral oration, in reference to the death 
of the Emperor Yalentinian, says : ' * Let us believe 
that Valentinian is ascended from the desert, that 

321 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

is to say, from this dry and unmanured (inculco) 
place, into those flowery delights, where being 
conjoined with his brother (Gratian) he enjoyeth 
the pleasures of everlasting life." St. Jerome 
comforts a good lady on this account, that we 
shall see our friends and know them. St. 
Augustine endeavors to mitigate the sorrow of 
an Italian widow with this consideration, that she 
will be restored to her husband, and behold and 
know him. 

Thus did the primitive Christians believe, while 
they sat at the graves of those they had loved in 
life and still loved in death, "with child-like resig- 
nation to that eternal love which takes in order 
to restore what it has taken under a more glorious 
form, which separates for a moment in order to 
reunite the separated in a glorious state through 
eternity. ' ' 

Revelation and Recognition 

In the evidences given in another chapter on 
the Old Testament and Immortality it is clearly 
shown that the Jews had precious and beautiful 
ideas, not only of immortality, but of heavenly 
recognition. 

The clearest testimony in all the Old Testament 
is that of David. When his child died, he said, 
"But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? 

322 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

Can I bring him back again! I shall go to him, 
but he shall not return to me. ' ' The source of his 
consolation was the belief that he should find his 
child again. Surely David did not think of his 
child as just among the dead and comfort himself 
with the hope he too should soon die, and be, like 
him, in the grave and free from trouble. Instead 
of yielding to despair, he was cheerfully resigned 
at the thought of going to his child. The rich con- 
solation this doctrine affords at such a time none 
but a parent can fully feel. How many parents 
would have been drawn after their sainted chil- 
dren into the grave by a cord of unrelenting grief, 
were it not that they drew consolation and hope 
from the same source wherewith this royal parent 
was comforted: "I shall go to him." 

In the New Testament the heavenly recognition 
is everywhere taught by implication. Suppose 
you were invited to a dinner. Do you not sup- 
pose the dinner would be a failure if you did not 
learn to know those who are seated with you at 
the table? Well, Christ promises that we shall 
sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the 
Kingdom of God, and if we shall know Abraham, 
Isaac and Jacob why not our loved ones that have 
gone long since! Heaven is the Father's house, 
"a family in heaven." It would be a strange 

323 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

family in which the members did not know each 
other. 

Paul in all his epistles speaks of the souls of the 
departed as forming a society above. He speaks 
of the congregated body of saints in heaven as 
« 'the family of God/' as "the household of God," 
and repeatedly refers to the fact that it was the 
purpose of Christ to bring together in one place all 
his believing people, where they would constitute 
one glorified society. Scattered families shall be 
reunited, suspended friendships shall be re- 
established and "we shall know even as also we 
are known." Glorious family reunion! Those 
who have preceded us to glory are still ours to be 
restored to us in fairer bloom when we have 
crossed the bar. 

That this is so will be abundantly evident from 
the following declarations of the Apostle Paul. 
Thus (II. Thess. 2 : 1), we read, "Now we beseech 
you brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, and by our gathering together unto him. ' ' 
Yes, when Jesus comes again, he will indeed 
(John 11 : 52) "gather together in one all the chil- 
dren of God that had been scattered abroad" over 
the surface of the earth during the successive 
generations of time. But, further, Paul not only 
speaks of this "gathering together" of the saints, 

324 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

but also of their being at length presented together 
by Christ unto the Father. Thus in II. Cor. 4 : 14, 
he says, "Knowing that he which raised up the 
Lord Jesus, shall raise us up also by Jesus, and 
shall present us with you. ' ' He declares that they 
shall not merely be "presented together, ' ' but that 
they shall also have "rest" along with each other, 
when, after the struggles and tribulations of this 
life are overcome, they shall be made to "sit 
together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." 
(Eph. 2:6.) For, in II. Thess. 1 : 7, after having 
declared that God shall "recompense tribulation" 
to them that troubled the saints, he adds that, to 
those troubled saints, the Lord will then give 
"rest with us." — that is, rest in company with 
us — "when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from 
heaven with his almighty angels." 

But a still more interesting passage, as bearing 
upon the subject before us, will be found in 
Thess. 4: 13-18, where we read: "But I would 
not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning 
them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as 
others which have no hope. For if we believe that 
Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which 
sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. For this 
we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we 
which are alive and remain unto the coming of the 

325 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Lord shall not precede them which are asleep. 
For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven 
with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and 
with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ 
shall rise first : then we which are alive and remain 
shall be caught up together with them in the 
clouds, to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we 
ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one 
another with these words.' ' 

The apostle here sets himself to comfort those 
who have been deprived by death of their Chris- 
tian friends, and who were still sorrowing under 
their crushing bereavements. And what is the 
consolation wherewith he comforts them? He 
says unto them, ' ' Sorrow not as others which have 
no hope; ,, but what was this "hope" which he 
speaks of as belonging peculiarly to them? Why 
it was that when God should bring their departed 
friends who were " asleep" in Jesus with him, 
that then they also which should be alive and 
remain would be ' t caught up together with them, ' ' 
or in company with them, "in the clouds, to meet 
the Lord in the air ; and so, ' ' he adds, l i shall we, ' ' 
even all of us, ' ' ever be with the Lord. ' ' " Where- 
fore," says he, "seeing that God shall thus event- 
ually bring our beloved dead with him, and that 
they and we shall be caught up together, or in 

326 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

each other's company, to meet the Lord, and that 
so we all, — that is, both onr deceased friends and 
ourselves, — shall be together and forever, with 
the Lord — comfort one another with these words, ' ' 
or with this, "blessed hope" of reunion and of a 
restored and perpetual communion which these 
words make known. 

The same truth is taught in Col. 3: 4, where 
Paul declares, "When Christ, who is our life, shall 
appear then shall ye also appear with him in 
glory. " Yes, the saints shall then know, better 
than they ever knew before, that they are not only 
"members of Christ," but also, "everyone mem- 
bers one of another." (Rom. 12: 5, and Eph. 
4: 21.) And so far from suffering any curtail- 
ment of privilege by their transference to the 
heavenly world, they will, throughout eternity, in 
a far higher and closer degree than ever they were 
in time, be permitted not merely to enjoy "fellow- 
ship with the Father, and with the Son Jesus 
Christ, ' ' but also to have the ' l fellowship one with 
another." For then, as "brethren" of the same 
Lord, and "joint heirs" of the same inheritance, 
and "children" of the same divine family, they 
will enjoy a closeness of intercourse to which 
they were comparative strangers whilst traveling 
through this desert wilderness of earth, 

327 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

The Continuance of Memory in the World 
to Come 

Memory will continue to be exercised after 
dentil and throughout eternity. If this were not 
so, we could not fully know either what we once 
were or what through grace we had become. Its 
exercise throughout eternity will promote our 
gratitude and joy, and its continuance will be 
necessary that we may fully feel our obligations 
to the Saviour and adequately praise him. How 
can we sing the new song of the redeemed unless 
we remember what great things have been done 
for us? 

The perpetuation of memory is necessary for 
the preservation of our very identity. Memory 
is an essential constituent of our mental nature, 
and deprived of it we should not be essentially 
ourselves. We should be no longer ourselves, but 
a new order of creatures. 

Christ came not to destroy humanity, but to 
redeem and purify it. There will be no essential 
change in either our mental or moral condition, 
and the faculties and feelings of our mortal state 
will be more fully developed in eternity than they 
were in time. 

Frequently, in the Scriptures, we find memory 
throughout eternity is assumed. Thus the father 

328 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

of the faithful in reasoning with Dives says, ' ' Son,* 
remember that thon in thy life time receivedst 
thy good things, and thou art tormented. " Dives 
is reminded of his former life and its good things, 
and Lazarus of his former state and its evil things, 
and from his request of Abraham, it is evident 
that Dives remembered his "five brethren" and 
"his father's house." Now, if memory will be 
retained by the lost, vdiy not more so by the glori- 
fied believer ? 

The continued exercise of memory is implied in 
all the descriptions of the judgment, in all those 
passages which teach our future accountability to 
God. Thus Paul says: "So then every one of 
us shall give account of himself to God." If 
memory be destroyed by death, vce should, when 
called before the "great white throne" have for- 
gotten all, and could not, therefore, give account 
of any. And so also that each one may be con- 
vinced of the righteousness of the award made for 
the things done in this body he must remember 
the things done by him, when in this body, — 
whether they had been good or bad. 

Individual Friendship Perpetuated 

It has been supposed that particular friend- 
ships will, in heaven, be swallowed up in universal 

329 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
* charity, but we do not find on earth that Christians, 
in proportion as they improve in charity toward 
all mankind, become less capable of personal 
friendship — less affectionate to their relatives 
and connections, but on the contrary those who 
are fullest of brotherly love toward all their fel- 
low creatures are also the warmest and steadiest 
in their nearer friendships. Why should it be 
otherwise in heaven? 

Can we suppose that a Christian in his glorified 
state will be more exalted than his great Master 
here on earth? He certainly was not incapable of 
friendship. 

Jesus Christ loved all mankind; he loved espe- 
cially the disciples who constantly followed him, 
but even among the apostles he distinguished one 
as more peculiarly and privately his friend. John 
was "the disciple whom Jesus loved.' ' Can we 
then, be ever too highly exalted to be incapable of 
friendship ? 

The extension and perfection of friendship will 
constitute a great part of the future happiness of 
the blest. I can see no reason why those who have 
been dearest friends on earth could not when 
admitted to that happy state continue to be so, 
with full knowledge and recollection of their for- 
mer friendship. 

330 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 
Love's Demand for Heavenly Recognition 

Paul says, "Love never faileth." It will con- 
tinue in the future life. We love the departed and 
they still love us. Though we may not converse 
with them or enter into actual physical communi- 
cation with them, there is a mystical communion 
of saints in which souls above and souls below 
enter into fellowship with each other. The little 
waif in Lady Somerset's orphanage understood 
this when upon finishing his usual prayer, he 
added: "And God would you mind giving my 
mother a kiss for me!" 

Theodore T. Munger says: "If death ends 
life, what is the world but an ever-yawning grave 
in which the loving Grod buries his children with 
hopeless sorrow, mocking at once their love, and 
hope and every attribute of his own nature?" 
There is a longing in man's heart to "mingle his 
conscious life with the life of all conscious beings 
in a blessed reciprocity of perfect and unending 
love." 

Shakespeare makes Hamlet say to his father's 
ghost : 

Remember thee? Aye thou poor ghost, 

While memory holds her seat in this distracted globe. 

Emerson, pouring out his heart in grief for his 
dead son, hears the deep Heart answering him: 

331 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Think'st beauty vanished from the coast 

Of matter, and thy darling lost? 

To be alone wilt thou begin 

When worlds of lovers hem thee in? 

When lie hears as the final word the 

Verdict which accumulates 

From lengthening scroll of human fates, 

Saying, What is excellent, 

As God lives, is permanent; 

Hearts are dust, heart's loves remain; 

Heart's love will meet thee again. 

To Tennyson it is morally inconceivable that 
love is perishable : 

If e'er when faith had fallen asleep, 
I heard a voice, "believe no more," 
And heard an ever-breaking shore 
That tumbled in the Godless deep ; 
A warmth within the breast would melt 
The freezing reason's colder part, 
And like a man in wrath the heart 
Stood up and answered "I have felt." 

Do not those wistfnl yearnings and nnsated 

loves that strain beyond the limits of this life, 

truly tell ns : 

'Bright in that happy land 

Beams every eye; 
Kept by a Father's hand 
Love cannot die. 

Christina Eosetti sings : 

'There no more parting, no more pain; 

The distant ones brought near; 
The lost so long are found again — 

Long lost, but longer dear. 

Tennyson, pouring out his heart full of im- 
mortal love for his dead friend Arthur Hallam, 
cries : 

332 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

Dear friend far-off, my lost desire, 
So far, so near in woe and weal ; 

loved the most when most I feel 
There is a lower and a higher. 

'Known and unknown; human, divine; 
Sweet human hand and lip and eye, 
Dear heavenly friend that canst not die, 
Mine, mine, forever, ever mine; 

'Far-off thou art, but ever nigh; 

1 have thee still, and I rejoice; 

I prosper, circled with thy voice; 
I shall not lose thee tho' I die. 

Browning, anticipating his last hour and his 
reunion with the sweet spirit who had been his 
wife for many years, exclaims : 

The element's rage, the fiend voices that rave 

Shall dwindle, shall blend, 
Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, 

Then a light, then thy breast, 
O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, 

And with God be the rest! 

Love Indestructible 

If the power to maintain our loved ones beyond 
the grave were ours we should assuredly exercise 
it. Our great yearning for the eternal life of 
those we love involves the certainty that the great 
heart of God will outsoar, in the eternal order 
which he has established, our highest desires. 
Southey sings : 

Love is indestructible, 

Its holy frame forever burnetii; 

From heaven it came, to heaven returneth; 

Too oft on earth a troubled guest — 

At times deceived, at times oppressed — 

333 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

It here is tried and purified, 

Then hath in heaven its perfect rest. 

It soweth here in toil and care, 

But the harvest time of love is there. 

When our friends have crossed the river, we are 
somehow still bound to them by the cords of a 
deathless love. "We can somehow never realize 
that they are gone. In every tear that we shed, 
and sigh that we heave we have so many proofs, 
in the soul itself, that the dead, whose memory we 
so fondly cherish, still live immortal beyond the 
grave. Henry Ward Beecher thus eloquently and 
forcefully tells what all of us have felt : 

' ' I never saw a man that did not believe in the 
immortality of love when following the body of a 
loved one to the grave. I have seen men in other 
circumstances that did not believe in it; but I 
never saw a man that, when he looked upon the 
form of one whom he really loved stretched out 
for burial, did not revolt from saying, 'It has all 
come to that : the hours of sweet companionship ; 
the wondrous interfacings of tropical souls, the 
joys, the hopes, the trusts, the unutterable yearn- 
ings, there they all lie\ No man can stand and 
look in a coffin upon the body of a fellow creature, 
and remember the flaming intelligence, the blos- 
soming love, the whole range of divine faculties 
which so lately animated that cold clay, and say, 

334 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

1 These have all collapsed and gone'. No person 
can witness the last ceremonials which are per- 
formed over the remains of a hnman being — the 
sealing down of the unopenable lid, the following 
of the rumbling procession to the place of burial, 
the letting of the dust down into dnst, the falling 
of the earth upon the hollow coffin, with those 
sounds that are worse than thunder, and the 
placing of the green sod over the grave — no per- 
son, unless he be a beast, can witness these things, 
and then turn away, and say, 'I have buried my 
wife; I have buried my child; I have buried my 
sister, my brother, my love'." 

We are richer for having loved, although we 
have lost. To quote Tennyson again : 

1 This truth came borne with bier and pall — 
I felt it when I sorrowed most; 
'Tis better to have loved and lost, 
Than never to have loved at all. 

We are richer because our dead are not lost to 
us. They have only passed into a higher, fuller, 
safer life, where they are secure from every 
danger and trial, and secure also for us. Whit- 
tier writes : 

'And yet, dear heart, remembering thee, 

Am I not richer than of old? 
Safe in thy immortality. 

What change can reach the wealth I hold? 

What change can mar the pearl and gold 
Thy love hath left in trust for me? 
And while in life's late afternoon, 
Where cool and long the shadows grow, 

335 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

I walk to meet the night that soon, 
Shall darkness and shadow overflow, 
I cannot feel that thou art far, 
Since near at need the angels are; 
And when the sunset gates unbar, 

Shall I not see thee waiting stand, 
And, white against the evening star, 

The welcome of thy beckoning hand? 

A poor helpless girl, a cripple, who was doomed 
from childhood to pain and deformity, but who, 
nevertheless, felt all the warm impulses of an 
immortal nature, thus wrote and sung of the 
" loved and lost" who had gone before: 

Our buried friends can we forget, 

Although they've passed death's gloomy river? 
They live within our memory yet, 

And in our love must live forever. 
And though they've gone awhile before, 

To join the ransomed host in heaven, 
Our hearts will love them more and more, 

Till earthly chains at last be riven. 

I heard them bid the world adieu; 

I saw them on the rolling billow; 
The far-off home appeared in view, 

While yet they pressed a dying pillow. 
I heard the parting pilgrim tell, 

While passing Jordan's lonely river, 
Adieu to earth, — now all is well — 

Now all is well with me forever. 

Oh! how I long to join their wing, 

And range their fields of blooming flowers; 
Come holy watchers, come and bring 

A mourner to your blissful bowers. 
I'd speed with rapture on my way, 

Nor would I pause at Jordan's river; 
With songs I'd enter endless day, 

And live with my loved friends forever. 

Adoniram Judson's Romance 

There was romance as well as Christian beauty 
in the life of Dr. Adoniram Judson, the great mis- 

336 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

sionary. In 1845, in the forty-fifth year of Mrs. 
Judson's age, and in the twenty-first year of her 
missionary life this excellent lady's health failed. 
It was seen that if she remained in the field she 
mnst soon sink into the grave. At last a voyage to 
America was named as presenting the only pros- 
pect of life. It was finally decided that she, with 
her hnsband and children, shonld enter npon this 
voyage. The thought of it was both pleasant and 
mournful. "To America! the land of her birth, 
and the home of many a loved one ; where parents, 
brothers and sisters still trod the soil, and where 
her darling, her orphan boy (the son of her former 
husband, the late Eev. George Dana Boardman, 
D.D.,) might once again be folded to her bosom." 
Oh, should she visit dear, Christian America once 
more? Yet she could not leave without sadness 
those for whom she had toiled and prayed during 
twenty years of her exile. Had it been right she 
would have preferred to die quietly in Burmah, 
rather than interrupt her husband's labors; and 
her heart sank at parting for years, if not for life, 
with the most helpless of her babes — the eldest 
of the three being only four years of age. But 
duty demanded the sacrifice, and she had been 
too long obedient to this voice to think of opposing 
it now. They bore her to the ship, while both fair 

337 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

and dusky faces circled round; and long did the 
sound of those loved, farewell voices, half smoth- 
ered in grief and choked with tears, dwell upon 
her ear and heart. Near the Isle of France hope 
of final recovery grew so strong that it became 
almost certainty, and now a voice from poor, per- 
ishable Burmah seemed calling on the invalid for 
one more sacrifice. She dared not go back herself, 
but there seemed no longer a necessity for calling 
her husband from his missionary labor. He 
should now return to his lonely home in Burmah, 
and she, with her children, would pursue a way 
as lonely toward the ' ' setting sun. ' ' It was after 
this resolution that the following lines, the last 
words ever traced by her fingers, were penciled 
on a scrap of paper. Let the reader observe how 
naturally and how touchingly, under the feeling 
of uncertainty whether they should ever meet 
again on earth, her heart dwells on the prospect 
of a heavenly meeting : 

We part on this green islet, Love, 

Thou for the Eastern main, 
I for the setting sun, Love — 

Oh, when to meet again? 

- My heart is sad for thee, Love, 
For lone thy way will be; 
And oft thy tears will fall, Love, 
For thy children and for me. 

The music of thy daughter's voice 
Thou'lt miss for many a year; 

338 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

And the merry shout of thine elder boys, 
Thou'lt listen in vain to hear. 

And when we knelt to see our Henry die, 

And heard his last faint moan, 
Each wiped away the other's tears — 

Now each must weep alone. 

v My tears fall fast for thee, Love, 
How can I say farewell? 
But go ! Thy God be with thee, Love, 
Thy heart's deep grief to quell! 

v Yet my spirit clings to thine, Love, 
Thy soul remains with me, 
And oft we'll hold communion sweet, 
O'er the dark and distant sea. 

And who can paint our mutual joy, 

When, all our wanderings o'er, 
We both shall clasp our infants three, 

At home on Burmah's shore! 

But higher shall our raptures glow, 

On yon celestial plain, 
When the loved and parted here below 

Meet, ne'er to part again. 

Then gird thine armor on, Love, 

Nor faint thou by the way, 
Till Booddha shall fall, and Burmah's sons 

Shall own Messiah's sway. 

She folded that manuscript, a relapse of her 
disease came on, and she died. Dr. Judson said 
he put her away on the island of St. Helena await- 
ing the resurrection. They had thought to part 
for a year or two ; now they parted forever, so far 
as this world is concerned. And he hastened on 
board after the funeral with his little children to 
start for Burmah, for the vessel had already 
lifted her sails ; and he says, "I sat down for some 

339 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

time in my cabin, my little children aronnd me 
crying 'mother, mother!' and I abandoned myself 
to heart-breaking grief. But one day the thought 
came over me as my faith stretched her wing that 
we should meet again in heaven, and I was com- 
forted.' ' Was it delusion? Lord, my God, what 
a delusion, what a glorious delusion! When he 
died did she meet him at the landing? I believe 
she did. 

Holy affections as well as glorious bodies shall 
come forth from the tomb. Suspended ties of love, 
which, like plants, whose life retired during winter 
into the bosom of the earth, will revive in vernal 
loveliness and blossom in an eternal spring. This 
is the immortality which Christ brought to light 
through the Gospel, this agreeable hope that we 
shall surely rise again in a new beauty when the 
eternal morning shall dawn upon the grave, this 
pleasurable anticipation which rises like a May 
sun over the world of social life, cheering, warm- 
ing and making it beautiful, subdues the keenness 
of grief and brightens up the short interval of 
sorrow between the death of our loved ones and 
our own, and sends back the light of comfort from 
the distant heavens upon the bleak shores of this 
mortal life. 

A man returning from a whaling voyage 
340 



SHALL WE KNOW EACH OTHER THERE? 

entered port at New Bedford. He had been three 
years on the cruise and had left his wife and little 
boy behind. The whaler had been reported as 
nearing land and the wife and little boy had gone 
down on the point that juts out a mile or more into 
the bay to keep a watch for the loved one. They 
had brought with them a sea-glass so that they 
might catch a glimpse of the familiar form at the 
earliest moment possible. Yonder, just off Cutty- 
hunk, the boat comes into sight with all canvas 
spread spanking along beneath a stiff breeze. 
See the woman now as she levels her glass — the 
throbbing breast, the flashing eye, the intense 
eagerness in every attitude and gesture, the flush 
of face, the cry of laughter, the tears of joy. She 
waves her handkerchief, as a welcome, on the 
breeze, while the boy dances for gladness, swing- 
ing and shouting over the water ; they see the hus- 
band and father, and he sees them and waves his 
tarpaulin as a sign of recognition. Ah! who can 
tell the joy of these loving hearts when husband 
clasps wife in his strong arms and the boy weeps 
for gladness on his neck? 

When we reach the land unswept by storm; 
when we enter the city and temple of our God, 
fresh from the clasp of death and our victory over 
death, we shall not feel alone in that multitude. The 

341 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

loved of long ago will gather about us and give us 
welcome. We shall be met at the landing. Those 
who loved us will greet us, speak our name and 
embrace us and Jesus will confess us before the 
angels. Those we have loved, and who have gone 
before, we shall find waiting for us at the portals 
and a band of beautiful immortals will surround 
us on that radiant shore, and with a holy rapture 
to which only the redeemed can give utterance, 
lead us to the exalted Saviour, and with us bow at 
His feet and from him receive the conqueror's 
crown. 



Poems of Comfort 



Why do we mourn when another star 

Shines out from the glittering sky? 
Do we weep when the voice of war, 

And the rage of conflict die? 
And why do our tears roll down, 

And our hearts be sorely riven, 
For another gem in the Saviour's crown, — 

Another soul in heaven? — Anon. 



In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not 
so I would have told you. . . . And if I go and prepare a 
place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; 
that where I am, there ye may be also. St. John 14 : 2, 3. 

For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this 
mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible 
shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have 
put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the say- 
ing that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. 
I. Corinthians 15: 53, 54. 

Having a desire to depart and to be with Christ; which is 
far better. Philippians 1 : 23. 



CHAPTER XII 

Poems of Comfort 
Blessed Are They That Mourn 

Oh, deem not they are blest alone 

Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep; 
The power who pities man, has shown 

A blessing for the eyes that weep. 

The light of smiles shall fill again 

The lids that overflow with tears ; 
And weary hours of woe and pain 

Are promises of happier years. 

There is a day of sunny rest 

For every dark and troubled night; 

And grief may bid an evening guest, 
But joy shall come with early light. 

And thou who o'er thy friend's low bier 
Dost shed the bitter drops like rain, 

Hope that a brighter, happier sphere 
Will give him to thy arms again. 

Nor let the good man's trust depart, 
Though life its common gifts deny, — 

Though with a pierced and bleeding heart; 
And spurned of men, he goes to die. 

For God hath marked each sorrowing day 

And numbered every secret tear, 
And heaven's long age of bliss shall pay 

For all his children suffer here. 

— William Cullen Bryant. 

Household Voices 

I long for household voices gone, 

For vanished smiles I long, 
But God hath led my dear ones on, 

And he can do no wrong. 

347 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

I know not what the future hath 

Of marvel or surprise, 
Assured alone that life and death 

His mercy underlies. 

And if my heart and flesh are weak 

To bear an untried pain, 
The bruised reed he will not break, 

But strengthen and sustain. 

And so beside the Silent Sea 

I wait the muffled oar; 
No harm from him can come to me 

On ocean and on shore. 

I know not where his islands lift 

Their fronded palms in air; 
I only know I cannot drift 

Beyond his love and care. 

— John Grcenleaf Whittier. 

Compensation 

Tears wash away the atoms in the eye 

That smarted for a day; 
Rain-clouds that spoiled the splendors of the sky 

The fields with flowers array. 

No chamber of pain but has some hidden door 

That promises release; 
No solitude so drear but yields its store 

Of thought and inward peace. 

No night so wild but brings the constant sun 

With love and power untold ; 
No time so dark but through its woof there run 

Some blessed threads of gold. 

And through the long and storm-tost centuries burn 

In changing calm and strife 
The Pharos-lights of truth, where'er we turn, — 

The unquenched lamps of life. 

O Love supreme! O Providence divine! 

What self-adjusting springs 
Of law and life, what even scales, are thine, 

What sure-returning wings. 

Of hopes and joys, that flit like birds away, 
When chilling autumn blows, 

348 



POEMS OF COMFORT 

But come again, long ere the buds of May 
Their rosy lips unclose! 

What wondrous play of mood and accident 

Through shifting days and years; 
What fresh returns of vigor overspent 

In feverish dreams and fears! 

What wholesome air of conscience and of thought 

When doubts and forms oppress; 
What vistas opening to the gates we sought 

Beyond the wilderness. 

Beyond the narrow cells, where self -involved, 

Like chrysalids, we wait 
The unknown births, the mysteries unsolved 

Of death and change and fate ! 

O Light divine ! we need no fuller test 

That all is ordered well ; 
We know enough to trust that all is best 

Where love and wisdom dwell. 

— Christopher Pearse Cranch. 



The Angel of Patience 

A Free Paraphrase op the German 

To weary hearts, to mourning homes, 
God's meekest Angel gently comes: 
No power has he to banish pain, 
Or give us back our lost again; 
And yet in tenderest love our dear 
And Heavenly Father sends him here. 

There's quiet in that Angel's glance 
There's rest in his still countenance! 
He mocks no grief with idle cheer, 
Nor wounds with words the mourner's ear; 
But ills and woes he may not cure 
He kindly trains us to endure. 

Angel of Patience ! sent to calm 
Our feverish brows with cooling palm; 
To lay the storms of hope and fear, 
And reconcile life's smile and tear; 
The throbs of wounded pride to still, 
And make our own our Father's will ! 

349 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

O thou who mournest on the way, 
With longings for the close of day; 
He walks with thee, that Angel kind, 
And gently whispers, "Be resigned: 
Bear up, bear on, the end shall tell 
The dear Lord ordereth all things well!" 

— John Greenleaf Whittier. 

The Parting Hour 

There's something in "the parting hour" 

Will chill the warmest heart — 
Yet kindred, comrades, lovers, friends, 

Are fated all to part; 
But this I've seen — and many a pang 

Has pressed it on my mind — 
The one who goes is happier 

Than those he leaves behind. 

No matter what the journey be — 

Adventurous, dangerous, far 
To the wild deep, or black frontier, 

To solitude, or war — 
Still something cheers the heart that dares, 

In all of human kind; 
And they who go are happier 

Than those they leave behind. 

The bride goes to the bridegroom's home 

With doubtings and with tears, 
But does not Hope her rainbow spread 

Across her cloudy fears? 
Alas! the mother who remains, 

What comfort can she find 
But this — the gone is happier 

Than the one she leaves behind. 

Have you a trusty comrade dear — 

An old and valued friend? 
Be sure your term of sweet concourse 

At length will have an end. 
And when you part — as part you will — 

Oh take it not unkind, 
If he who goes is happier 

Than you he leaves behind. 

God wills it so, and so it is; 

The pilgrims on their way, 
Though weak and worn, more cheerful are 

Than all the rest who stay. 

350 



POEMS OF COMFORT 

And when, at last, poor man, subdued, 

Lies down to death resigned, 
May he not still be happier far 

Than those he leaves behind? 

— Edward Pollock. 

How Long? 

My God, it is not f retfulness 

That makes me say, "How long?" 

It is not heaviness of heart 
That hinders me in song; 

'Tis not despair of truth and right, 
Nor coward dread of wrong. 

But how can I, with such hope 

Of glory and of home, 
With such a joy before my eyes, 

Not wish the time were come, 
Of years the jubilee, of days 

The Sabbath and the sun? 

These years, what ages they have been ! 

This life, how long it seems! 
And how, can I, in evil days, 

'Mid unknown hills and streams, 
But sigh for those of home and heart, 

And visit them in dreams? 

Yet peace, my heart; and hush, my tongue; 

Be calm, my troubled breast; 
Each restless hour is hastening on 

The everlasting rest; 
Thou knowest that the time thy God 

Appoints for thee is best. 

Let faith, not fear, nor fretfulness 

Awake the cry, "How long?" 
Let no faint-heartedness of soul 

Damp thy aspiring song; 
Eight comes, truth dawns, the night departs 

Of error and of wrong. 

— Horatius Bonar. 

Lights and Shades 

The gloomiest day hath gleams of light, 
The darkest wave hath bright foam near it; 

And twinkles through the cloudiest night 
Some solitary star to cheer it. 

351 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

The gloomiest soul is not all gloom, 

The saddest hour is not all sadness; 
And sweetly o'er the darkest doom 

There shines some lingering beam of gladness. 

Despair is never quite despair, 

Nor life, nor death the future closes; 
And round the shadowy brow of care 

Will hope and fancy twine thy roses. 

— Mrs. F. D. Hemans. 

Thy Way 

Thy way, not mine, Lord! 

However dark it be ; 
Lead me by Thine own hand, 

Choose out the path for me. 

Smooth let it be, or rough, 

It will be still the best; 
Winding or straight, it leads 

Right onward to Thy rest. 

I dare not choose my let; 

I would not if I might; 
Choose then for me, my God; 

So shall I walk aright. 

Daily Strength 

As thy day thy strength shall be, 
This should be enough for thee; 
He who knows thy frame will spare 
Burdens more than thou canst bear. 

When the days are veiled in night 
Christ shall give thee heavenly light; 
Seem they wearisome and long, 
Yet in Him thou shall be strong. 

Cold and wintry though they prove, 
Thine the sunshine of His love; 
Or with fervid heat oppressed, 
In His shadow thou shalt rest. 

When thy days on earth are past, 
Christ shall call thee home at last, 
His redeeming love to praise, 
Who has strengthened all thy days. 

— Frances Ridley Havergal. 

352 



POEMS OF COMFORT 

The Rift in the Clouds 

There comes a time in the lives of men, 

And women, too, I ween, 

When the sum of our strivings is reckoned up, 

And the total product seen. 

When the joy and triumph that is ours to-day, 

Atones for the failure of yesterday. 

When the rift in the clouds shows the shining sun, 

Which illumes the record of victories won, 

And the tears that are shed in the midnight gloom, 

Having v/atered the roses now in bloom, 

Shall be by the great Assayer weighed, 

And the justly accounted tribute paid. 

The merit is thine, perhaps, or mine, 
The awarder of merit, the Giver Divine. 
Then onward press, though the way is long, 
The applause of the audience follows the song, 
And the goal may be near or far away, 
Or the final triumph may come to-day. 

Not a sparrow falleth, the promise reads, 
Should our hairs be numbered and not our deeds? 
Was the Man of sorrows chosen king 
By those of his nation ; or sent to bring 
"Peace on earth" in God's own way? 
A gift we accept and reject each day. 

The promise fulfilled, the debt is paid, 

And by this measure shall each be weighed, 

By a balance which held in a Mighty hand, 

The recording angel shall understand, 

And success and failure, adjusted right, 

By the Spirit which strengthens the arm to fight. 

And my commission may come to-day, 

Or withheld till the stone shall be rolled away. 

— Laurenstine Yorke. 

No Cross Borne in Vain 

A picture memory brings to me : 
I look across the years and see 
Myself beside my mother's knee. 

I feel her gentle hand restrain 

My selfish moods, and know again 

A child's blind sense of wrong and pain. 

353 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

But wiser now, a man gray grown, 
My childhood's needs are better known, 
My mother's chastening love I own. 

Gray grown, but in our Father's sight 
A child still groping for the light 
To read His works and ways aright. 

I wait, in his good time to see 
That as my mother dealt with me 
So with His children dealeth He. 

I bow myself beneath His hand; 
That pain itself was wisely planned 
I feel and partly understand. 

The joy that comes in sorrow's guise, 
The sweet pains of self-sacrifice, 
I would not have them otherwise. 

And what were life and death, if sin 
Knew not the dread rebuke within, 
The pang of merciful discipline? 

Not with any proud despair of old, 
Crowned stoic of Rome's noblest mould! 
Pleasure and pain alike I hold. 

I suffer with no pain pretence 
Of triumph over flesh and sense; 
Yet trust the grievous Providence. 

How dark soe'er it seems, may tend, 
By ways I cannot comprehend, 
To some unguessed, benignant end. 

That every loss and lapse may gain, 
The clear-aired heights by step of pain, 
And never cross is borne in vain. 

—J. G. Whittier. 

Spin Cheerfully 

Spin cheerfully, 

Not tearfully, 
Though wearily you plod. 

Spin carefully, 

Spin prayerfully, 
But leave the thread to God. 

354 



POEMS OF COMFORT 

The shuttles of His purpose move 

To carry out His own design, 
Seek not too soon to disapprove 

His work, nor yet assign 
Dark motives, when with silent dread 

You view each sombre fold, 
For lo ! within each darker thread 

There shines a thread of gold. 

Spin cheerfully, 

Not tearfully, 
He knows the way you plod; 

Spin carefully, 

Spin prayerfully, 
But leave the thread with God. 

A Silvery Light for Every Cloud 

For every cloud, a silvery light, 

God wills it so. 
For every vale a shining height, 
A glorious morn for every night, 

And birth for labor's throe. 

For snow's white wing, a verdant field; 

A gain for loss, 
For buried seed the harvest yield; 
For pain, a strength, a joy revealed, 

A crown for every cross. 

Trust and Submission 

My God, I thank Thee : may no thought 
E'er deem Thy chastisement severe; 

But may this heart by sorrow taught, 
Calm each wild wish, each idle fear. 

Thy mercy bids all nature bloom ; 

The sun shines bright, and man is gay, 
Thy equal mercy spreads the gloom 

That darkens o'er this little day. 

Full many a throb of grief and pain 
Thy frail and erring child must know; 

But not one prayer is breathed in vain, 
Nor does one tear unheeded flow. 

The various messengers employ, 

Thy purposes of love fulfil; 
And mid the wreck of human joy, 

Let kneeling faith adorn Thy will. 

— Andrew Norton. 

355 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Leona 

Leona, the hour draws nigh, 

The hour we've awaited so long 
For the angel to open a door through the sky, 
That my spirit may break through the prison and try 

Its voice in an infinite song. 

Just now, as the slumbers of night 

Come o'er me with peace-giving breath, 
The curtain, half-lifted, revealed to my sight 
Tho?e windows which look on the kingdom of light 

That borders the river of death. 

And a vision fell, solemn and sweet, 

Bringing gleams of a morning-lit land; 
I saw the white shore which the pale waters beat, 
And I heard the low lull as they broke on their feet 

Who walked on the beautiful strand. 

And I wondered why spirits should cling 

To their clay with a struggle and sigh, 
When life's purple autumn is better than spring, 
And the soul flies away, like a sparrow to sing 

In a climate where leaves never die. 

Leona, come close to my bed, 

And lay your dear hand on my brow 
The same touch that thrilled me in days that are fled, 
And raised the lost roses of youth from the dead, 

Can brighten the brief moments now. 

I thank the Great Father for this, 

That our love is not lavished in rain; 
Each germ, in the future, will blossom to bliss, 
And the forms that we love, and the lips that we kiss, 

Never shrink at the shadow of pain. 

By the light of this faith am I taught 

That my labor is only begun; 
In the strength of this hope have I struggled and fought 
With the legions of wrong, till my armor has caught 

The gleam of Eternity's sun. 

Leona, look forth and behold, 

From headland, from hillside and deep, 
The day-king surrenders his banners of gold; 
The twilight advances through woodland and wold, 

And the dews are beginning to weep. 



POEMS OF COMFORT 

The moon's silver hair lies uncurled, 

Down the broad-breasted mountains away; 
Ere sunset's red glories again shall be furled, 
On the walls of the West, o'er the plains of the world 
I shall rise in a limitless day. 

O ! come not in tears to my tomb, 

Nor plant with frail flowers the sod ; 
There is rest among roses too sweet for its gloom, 
And life where the lilies eternally bloom 

In the balm-breathing gardens of God. 

Yet deeply those memories burn, 

Which bind me to you and to earth; 
And I sometimes have thought that my being would yearn 
In the bowers of its beautiful home, to return, 

And visit the place of its birth. 

'Twould be pleasant to stay, 

And walk by your side to the last; 
But the land-breeze of heaven is beginning to play — 
Life's shadows are meeting Eternity's day 

And its tumult is hushed in the past. 

Leona, good-bye. Should the grief 

Which is gathering now, ever be 
Too dark for your faith, you will long for relief, 
And remember, the journey tho' lonesome, is brief 

Over lowland and river to me. 

— James Allen Clark. 



< 



Sweet, Sweet Hope! 



Beyond the smiling and the weeping 

I shall be soon; 
Beyond the waking and the sleeping, 
Beyond the sowing and the reaping, 
I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home! 

Sweet hope! 
Lord, tarry not, but come. 

Beyond the blooming and the fading 

I shall be soon; 
Beyond the shining and the shading, 
Beyond the hoping and the dreading, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home! 

357 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Beyond the rising and the setting 

I shall be soon; 
Beyond the calming and the fretting, 
Beyond remembering and forgetting, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home! 

Beyond the gathering and the strowing 

I shall be soon; 
Beyond the ebbing and the flowing, 
Beyond the coming and the going, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home! 

Beyond the parting and the meeting 

I shall be soon; 
Beyond the farewell and the greeting, 
Beyond this pulse's fever beating, 

I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home! 

Beyond the frost chain and the fever 

I shall be soon; 
Beyond the rock-waste and the river, 
Beyond the ever and the never, 
I shall be soon. 
Love, rest, and home! 

Sweet hope! 
Lord, tarry not, but come. 

— Horatius Bonar. 

To Myself 

Let nothing make thee sad or fretful, 
Or too regretful; 

Be still; 
What God hath ordered must be right; 
Then find it in thine own delight, 

My will. 

Why shouldst thou fill to-day with sorrow 
About to-morrow, 

My heart? 
One watches all with care most true; 
Doubt not that he will give thee too 

Thy part. 

Only be steadfast; never waver, 
Nor seek earth's favor, 
But rest: 

358 



POEMS OP COMFORT 

Thou knowest what God wills must be 
For all his creatures, so for thee, 

The best. 
From the German of PAUL FLEMING. 

— Translation of Catherine Winkworth. 

The Heavenly Sculptor 

Shrink not from sufferings. Each dear blow 
From which thy smitten spirit bleeds 

Is but a messenger to show 
The renovation which it needs. 

The earthly sculptor smites the rock; 

Loud the relentless hammer rings; 
And from the rude unshapen block 

At length imprisoned beauty brings. 

Thou art the rude unshapen stone, 

And waitest till the arm of strife 
Shall make its crucifixion known 

And smite and carve them into life. 

The heavenly Sculptor works on thee; 

Be patient. Soon his arm of might 
Shall from thy prison's darkness free, 

And change thee to a form of light. 

— Thomas C. Upham. 

God's Sure Help in Sorrow 

(Leave all to God, 
Forsaken one, and stay thy tears ; 

For the Highest knows thy pain, 
Sees thy sufferings and thy fears; 
Thou shalt not wait his help in vain; 
Leave all to God. 

Be still and trust! 
For Ms strokes are strokes of love, 

Thou must for thy profit bear; 
He thy filial fear would move, 
Trust thy Father's loving care, 
Be still and trust! 

f Know, God is near! 
Though thou think'st him far away, 
Though his mercy long hath slept, 
He will come and not delay, 

When his child enough hath wept, 
For God is near! 

359 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Oh, teach him not 
When and how to hear thy prayers; 

Never doth our God forget; 
He the cross who longest bears 

Finds his sorrows' bounds are set; 
Then teach him not! 

If thou love him, 
Walking truly in his ways, 

Then no trouble, cross or death 
E'er shall silence faith and praise; 
All things serve thee here beneath, 
If thou love God. 

From the German of 

ANTON ULRICH, Duke of Brunswick, 1667. 
— Translation of Catherine Winkworth, 1855. 



The Tearless Land 



We're going home, we've had visions bright 
Of that holy land, that world of light, 
Where the long dark night of time is past, 
And the morn of eternity dawns at last; 
Where the weary saints no more shall roam, 
But dwell in a happy, peaceful home : 
Where the brow with sparkling gems is crown'd, 
And the waves of bliss are flowing round. 

Oh! that beautiful world! Oh, that beautiful world! 

— Anon. 



Thine eyes shall see the king in his beauty: they shall 
behold a far-stretching land. Isa. 33: 17. 

But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly: 
wherefore God is not ashamed of them, to be called their God; 
for he hath prepared for them a city. Heb. 11 : 16. 

They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; 
neither shall the sun strike upon them, nor any heat: for 
the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall be their 
shepherd, and shall guide them unto fountains of waters of 
life: and God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes. 
Rev. 7: 16, 17. 



CHAPTER XIII 
The Tearless Land 



Our floral forget-me-nots blossom and die 
When the winds of the autumn sweep chillingly by; 
But the heart's bright forget-me-nots never shall fade 
When under the white drifts our loved ones are laid; 
And the days, as they fly o'er the dial of time, 
Are bringing us nearer to that brighter clime 
Where we shall again our best loved ones embrace, 
And the glories of home shall earth's sorrows efface. 

We weave from fair blossoms a cross and a crown, 

And on the cold coffin we lay them both down; 

Tis all we can do; we'll adorn the fair clay 

Ere under the white drifts we lay it away. 

But the days, as they fly o'er the dial of time, 

Are bringing us nearer to that brighter clime 

Where the crowns are not leaves that must wither and mould, 

But they sparkle with jewels and glisten with gold. 

We sing our sweet hymns round the slumbering clay 
Ere under the white drifts we lay it away; 
And we lift our dim eyes to the kingdom above, 
Unto Him who chastises us only in love. 
O ! the days, as they fly o'er the dial of time, 
Are bringing us nearer to that brighter clime 
Where the songs of the blest with the sainted we'll sing 
At the feet of our Prophet, our Priest, and our King. 

W 7 e bury the dead we so love, from our sight, 

While a star beameth forth from the depth of our night; 

It comforts the heart and dispelleth the gloom, 

As we follow the dead to the rest of the tomb. 

O ! the days, as they fly o'er the dial of time, 

Are bringing us nearer to that brighter clime 

Where "the King in His beauty," the Bethlehem Star, 

Shall cheer us forever in kingdoms afar. 

— John II. Yates. 

365 



Co 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
The Undiscovered Country 

THE QUESTION 



Could we but know 
The land that ends our dark, uncertain travel, 

Where lie those happier hills and meadows low; 
Ah! if beyond the spirit's inmost cavil 

Aught of that country could we surely know, 
Who would not go? 

Might we but hear 
The hovering angel's high imagined chorus, 

Or catch, betimes, with wakeful eyes and clear 
One radiant vista of the realm before us, — 
With one rapt moment given to see and hear, 
Ah, who would fear? 

Were we quite sure 
To find the peerless friend who left us lonely, 
Or there, by some celestial stream as pure, 
To gaze in eyes that here were lovelit only, — 
This weary mortal coil, were we quite sure, 
Who would endure? 

— Edmund Clarence Stedman. 

THE ANSWER 

"Who would not go" 
With buoyant steps, to gain that blessed portal, 

Which opens to the land we long to know? 
Where shall be satisfied the souls immortal, 
Where we shall drop the wearying and the woe 
In resting so? 

"Ah, who would fear?" 
Since, sometimes through the distant pearly portal, 

Unclosing to some happy soul a-near, 
We catch a gleam of glorious light immortal, 
And strains of heavenly music faintly hear, 
Breathing good cheer! 

"Who would endure" 
To walk in doubt and darkness with misgiving, 

When he whose tender promises are sure — 
The Crucified, the Lord, the Ever-living — 
Keeps us those "mansions" evermore secure 
By waters pure? 

366 



THE TEARLESS LAND 

wondrous land! 
Fairer than all our spirit's fairest dreaming: 

"Eye hath not seen," no heart can understand 
The things prepared, the cloudless radiance streaming. 
^ How longingly we wait our Lord's command — 
His opening hand! 

O dear ones there ! 
Whose voices, hushed, have left our pathway lonely, 

We come, erelong, your blessed home to share; 
We take the guiding hand, we trust it only — 
Seeing, by faith, beyond this clouded air, 

That land so fair! — Anon. 

Beyond 

Beyond life's toils and cares, 
Its hopes and joys, its weariness and sorrow, 
Its sleepless nights, its days of smiles and tears, 
Will be a long, sweet life unmarked by years, 

One bright unending morrow. 

Beyond time's troubled stream, 
Beyond the chilling waves of death's dark river, 
Beyond life's lowering clouds and fitful gleams, 
Its dark realities and brighter dreams, 

A'beautiful forever. 

No aching hearts are there, 
No tear-dimmed eye, no form by sickness wasted, 
No cheek grown pale through penury or care, 
No spirits crushed beneath the woes they bear, 

No sigh for bliss untasted. 

No sad farewell is heard, 
No lonely wail for loving ones departed, 
No dark remorse is there o'er memories stirred, 
No smile of scorn, no harsh or cruel word 

To grieve the broken hearted. 

No long, dark night is there, 
No light from sun or silvery moon is given, 
But Christ, the Lamb of God all bright and fair, 
Illumes the city with effulgence rare, 

The glorious light of heaven. 

No mortal eye hath seen 
The glories of that land beyond the river, 
Its crystal lakes, its fields of living green, 
Its fadeless flowers and the unchanging sheen 

Around the throne forever. 

367 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Ear hath not heard the songs 
Of rapturous praise within that shining portal, 
No heart of man hath dreamed what bliss belongs 
To that redeemed and joyous blood-washed throng, 

All glorious and immortal. — Mrs. J. E. Akers. 

The One Glad Day 

There is no night in heaven; 

In that blest world above 
Work never can bring weariness, 

For work itself is love. 
There is no night in heaven; 

Yet nightly round the bed 
Of every Christian wanderer 

Faith hears an angel tread. 

There is no grief in heaven; 

For life is one glad day, 
And tears are of those former things 

Which all have passed away. 
There is no grief in heaven; 

Yet angels from on high 
On golden pinions earthward glide, 

The Christian's tears to dry. 

There is no sin in heaven; 

Behold that blessed throng, 
All holy in their spotless robes, 

All holy in their song! 
There is no sin in heaven, 

Here, who from sin is free? 
Yet angels aid us in our strife 

For Christ's true liberty. 

There is no death in heaven, 

For they who gain that shore 
Have won their immortality, 

And they can die no more. 
There is no death in heaven, 

But when the Christian dies, 
The angels 'wait his parted soul, 

And waft it to the skies. 

— Frederick D. Huntington. 

There is Light Beyond 

Beyond the stars that shine in golden glory, 

Beyond the calm, sweet moon, 
Up the bright ladder, saints have trod before thee, 

Soul, thou shalt venture soon. 

368 



THE TEARLESS LAND 

Secure with Him who sees thy heartsick yearning, 

Safe in His arms of love, 
Thou shalt exchange the midnight for the morning 

And thy fair home above. 

Oh! it is sweet to watch the world's night wearing, 

The Sabbath morn come on, 
And sweet it were the vineyard labor sharing — 

Sweeter the labor done. 
All finished ! all the conflict and the sorrow, 

Earth's dream of anguish o'er; 
Deathless there dawns for thee a nightless morrow 

On Eden's blissful shore. 

Patience ! then, patience ! soon the pangs of dying 

Shall all forgotten be, 
And thou, through rolling spheres rejoicing, flying 

Beyond the waveless sea, 
Shalt know hereafter where thy Lord doth lead thee, 

His darkest dealings trace, 
And by those fountains where His love will feed thee, 

Behold Him face to face. 

Then bow thine head, and God shall give thee meekness 

Bravely to do His will; 
So shall arise His glory in thy weakness — 

Oh, struggling soul, be still! 
Dark clouds are His pavilion shining o'er thee; 

Thine heart must recognize 
The veiled Shekinah moving on before thee, 

Too bright to meet thine eyes. 

Behold the wheels that straightly moves, and fleetly 
^ — Performs the sovereign word; 
Thou know'st His suffering love! then suffering meekly> 

Follow thy loving Lord ! 
Watch on the tower, and listen by the gateway, 

Nor weep to wait alone; 
Take thou thy spices, and some angel straightway 

Shall roll away the stone. 

Then shalt thou tell thy living Lord hath risen, 

And risen but to save; 
Tell of the might that breaks the captive's prison, 

And life beyond the grave! 
Tell how He met thee, all His radiance shrouded; 

How in thy deep sorrow came 
His pitying voice breathing, when faith was clouded, 

Thine own familiar name. 

369 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

So at the grave's last portal thou may'st linger, 

And hymn some happy strain; 
The passing world may mock the feeble singer — 

Heed not, but sing again. 
Thus wait, thus watch, till He the last link sever, 

And changeless rest be won; 
Then in His glory thou shall bask forever, 

Fear not the clouds — press on! — Anon. 

What Must It Be To Be There ? 

We speak of the realms of the blest 

Of that country so bright and so fair, 
And oft are its glories contest, 

But what must it be to be there? 

We speak of its pathways of gold, 

Of its walls decked with jewels so rare, 

Of its wonders and pleasures untold, — 
But what must it be to be there? 

We speak of its freedom from sin, 
From sorrow, temptation and care, 

From trials without and within, 
But what must it be to be there? 

We speak of its service of love, 

Of the robes which the glorified wear, 

Of the Church of the first-born above, 
But what must it be to be there? 

Do Thou, Lord, 'midst sorrow and woe, 

For heaven, my spirit prepare, 
And shortly I also shall know, 
And feel what it is to be there! 

— Mrs. Elizabeth Mills. 

The Circle Complete 

Ours is the grief, who still are left in this far wilderness 
Which will at times, now they are gone, seem blank and com- 
fortless. 
For moments spent with loving hearts are breezes from the 

hills, 
And the balm of Christian brotherhood like Eden's dew distils : 
And we whose footsteps and whose hearts so often fail and 

faint, 
Seem ill to spare the cheering voice of one departed saint. 

370 



THE TEARLESS LAND 

But oh, we sorrow not like those who no bright hopes sustain, 
For them who sleep in Jesus, God will bring with him again, 
Love craves the presence and the sight of all its well-beloved, 
And therefore weep we in the homes whence they are far 

removed, 
Love craves the presence and the sight of each beloved one, 
And therefore Jesus spake the word which caught them to 

his throne: 
"Father, I will that all my own, that thou hast granted me, 
Be with me where I am to share my glory's bliss with thee." 

Thus heaven is gathering, one by one, in its capacious breast, 
All that is pure and permanent, and beautiful and blest, 
The family is scatter'd yet, though of one home and heart, 
Part militant in earthly gloom, in heavenly glory part. 
But who can speak the rapture, when the circle is complete, 
And all the children sunder 'd now around one Father meet? 
One fold, one Shepherd, one employ, one everlasting home: 
"Lo ! I come quickly." "Even so, Amen : Lord Jesus, come." 

— Edivard Henry Bickersteth. 

I See Thee Still 

I see thee still ! 
Remembrance, faithful to her trust, 
Calls thee in beauty from the dust. 
Thou comest in the morning light, 
Thou'rt with me in the gloomy night, 
In dreams I meet thee as of old, 
Then thy soft arms my neck enfold, 
And thy sweet voice is in mine ear, 
In every scene to memory dear 

I see thee still ! 

I see thee still ! 
In every hallowed token round; 
This little ring thy finger bound, 
This lock of hair thy forehead shaded, 
This silken chain by thee was braided; 
These flowers, now withered just like thee, 
Sweet sister, thou didst cull for me; 
This book was thine, here didst thou read. 
This picture — ah, yes ! here, indeed, 

I see thee still ! 

I see thee still ! 
Here was thy summer's noon retreat; 
Here was thy favorite fireside seat, 
This was thy chamber, — here each day, 
I sat and watched thy sad decay, 

371 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Here on this bed thou last didst lie, 
Here on this pillow thou didst die : 
Dark hour! Once more its hours unfold! 
As then I saw thee pale and cold, 
I see thee still ! 

I see thee still! 
Thou art not in the grave confined — 
Death cannot claim the immortal mind, 
Let earth close o'er its sacred trust, 
But goodness dies not in the dust. 
Thee, my sister! 'tis not thee 
Beneath the coffin's lid I see; 
Thou to a fairer land art gone! 
Then let me hope, my journey done, 

To see thee still! — Charles Sprague. 



Reunions in Heaven 



Death, with his healing hand, 

Shall once more knit the band 
Which needs but that one link which none may sever; 

Till, through the only Good, 

Heard, felt and understood, 
Our life in God shall make us one forever. — Anon. 



But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concern- 
ing them which are asleep ; that ye sorrow not, even as others, 
which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and 
rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God 
bring with him. I. Thess. 4 : 13, 14. 

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, with a 
shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of 
God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we, which 
are alive and remain, shall together, with them, be caught up 
in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and shall we ever 
be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with 
these words. I. Thess. 4: 16-18. 



CHAPTER XIV 

Reunions in Heaven 
The Family in Heaven 

'Tis but one family — the sound is balm, 
A seraph- whisper to the wounded heart, 

It lulls the storm of sorrow to a calm, 

And draws the venom from the avenger's dart. 

'Tis but one family — the accents come 

Like light from heaven to break the night of woe, 
The banner-cry, to call the spirit home, 

The shout of victory o'er a fallen foe. 

Death cannot separate — is memory dead? 

Has thought, too, vanished, and has love grown chill? 
Has every relic and memento fled, 

And are the living only with us still. 

No ! in our hearts the lost we mourn remain, 

Objects of love and ever-fresh delight; 
And fancy leads them in her fairy train, 

In half-seen transports past the mourner's sight. 

Yes ! in ten thousand ways, or far or near, 
The called by love, by meditation brought, 

In heavenly visions yet they haunt us here, 
The glad companions of our sweetest thought. 

Death never separates, the golden wires 
That ever trembled to their names before, 

Will vibrate still, though every form expires, 
And those we love, we look upon no more. 

No more indeed in sorrow and in pain, 

But even memory's need erelong will cease, 

For we shall join the lost of love again, 
In endless bonds, and in eternal peace. 

— James Edmeston. 

377 



I 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 
My Dead 



cannot think of them as dead 
Who walk with me no more; 
Along the path of life I tread 
They have but gone before. 

The Father's house is mansioned fair 

Beyond my vision dim; 
All souls are his, and here or there 

Are living unto him. 

And still their silent ministry 

Within my heart hath place, 
As when on earth they walked with me 

And met me face to face. 

Their lives are made forever mine; 

What they to me have been 
Hath left henceforth its seal and sign 

Engraven deep within. 

Mine are they by an ownership 

Nor time nor death can free; 
For God hath given to Love to keep 

Its own eternally. 

— Frederick L. Hosmer. 

Soon With Thee 

Our beloved have departed, 

While we tarry, broken-hearted, 
In the dreary, empty house; 
They have ended life's brief story; 
They have reached the home of glory, 

Over death victorious ! 

Hush that sobbing; weep more lightly; 

On we travel, daily, nightly, 
To the rest that they have found; 
Are we not upon the river, 
Sailing fast to meet forever 

On more holy, happy ground? 

Whilst with bitter tears we're mourning, 

Thought to buried loves returning, 
Time is hasting us along, 
Downward to the grave's dark dwelling, 
Upward to the fountain welling 

With eternal life and song! 

378 



REUNIONS IN HEAVEN 

See ye not the breezes hying, 

Clouds along in hurry flying? 
But we haste more swiftly on, 
Ever changing our position, 
Ever tossed in strange transition, 

Here to-day, to-morrow gone. 

Every hour that passes o'er us 

Speaks of comfort yet before us, 
Of our journey's rapid rate; 
And, like passing vesper bells, 
The clock of time its chiming tells 

At eternity's broad gate. 

On we haste to home invited, 

There with friends to be united 
In a surer bond than here, 
Meeting soon, and met forever; 
Glorious hope forsake us never, 

For thy glimmering light is dear. 

Ah, the way is shining clearer, 

As we journey, ever nearer 
To the everlasting home, 
Friends who there await our landing, 
Comrades round the throne now standing, 

We salute you, and we come! 

— From the German of J. Lange. 

Longing for Reunion 

Away with death — away 
With all her sluggish sleep and chilling damps. 

Impervious to the day, 
Where Nature sinks into inanity. 

How can the soul desire 
Such hateful nothingness to crave, 

And yield with joy the vital fire 
To moulder in the grave! 

Yet mortal life is sad, 
Eternal storms molest its sullen sky; 

And sorrow ever rife 
Drain the sacred fountain dry 

Away with mortal life! 
But hail the calm reality, 
The seraph immortality! 
Hail the heavenly bowers of peace 
Where all the storms of passion cease. 
Life's dismaying struggle o'er, 
The wearied weeps no more; 

379 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

But wears the eternal smile of joy, 

Tasting bliss without alloy. 

Welcome, welcome happy bowers, 

Where no passing tempest lowers. 

But the azure heavens display 

The everlasting smile of day; 

Where the choral seraph choir 

Strike the harmonious lyre; 

And the spirit sinks to ease, 

Lulled by distant symphonies. 

Oh, to think of meeting there, 

The friends whose graves received our tear, 

The daughter loved, the wife adored, 

To our widowed arms restored; 

And all the joys which death did sever, 

Given to us again forever! 

Who would cling to wretched life, 

And hug the poisoned thorn of strife; 

Who would not long from earth to fly, 

A sluggish senseless lump to lie, 

When the glorious prospect lies 

Full before his raptured eyes? — H. K. White. 

Light at Eventide 

At evening time let there be light: 
Life's little day draws near its close; 

Around me fall the shades of night, 
The night of death, the grave's repose; 
To crown my joys, to end my woes, 

At evening time let there be light. 

At evening time let there be light : 
Stormy and dark hath been my day; 

Yet rose the morn divinely bright, 

Dew, birds, and blossoms cheered the way; 
Oh, for one sweet, one parting ray ! 

At evening time let there be light. 

At evening time there shall be light, 

For God hath spoke — it must be; 
Fear, doubt, and anguish take their flight — 

His glory now is risen on me, 

Mine eyes shall His salvation see, 
'Tis evening time, and there is light. 

Recognition in the Resurrection 

And shall I e'er again thy features trace, 
Beloved friend; thy lineaments review? 
Yes; though the sunken eye and the livid hue, 

380 



REUNIONS IN HEAVEN 

And lips compressed, have quenched each lively grace, 
Death's triumph; still I recognize the face 

Which thine for many a year affection knew; 

And what forbids, that, clothed with life anew, 
It still on memory's tablet holds its place? — 
Tho' then thy cheek with deathless bloom be sheen, 

And rays of splendor wreathe thy sun-like brow, 
That change I deem shall sever not between 

Thee and thy former self; nor disallow 
That love's tried eye discern thee through the screen 
Of glory then, as of corruption now. — Bishop Mant. 

The Departure of Friends 

Friend after friend departs : 
(_...-- Who hath not lost a friend? 
There is no union here of hearts, 

That finds not here an end. 
Were this frail world only rest, 
Living or dying, none were blest. 

Beyond the flight of time, 

Beyond this vale of death, 
There surely is some blessed clime 

Where life is not a breath. 
Nor life's affection transient fire, 
Whose sparks fly upward to expire. 

There is a world above, 

Where parting is unknown; 
A whole eternity of love, 

Formed for the good alone; 
And faith beholds the dying here, 
Translated to that happier shore. 

Thus star by star declines, 

Till all are passed away, 
As morning high and higher shines, 

To pure and perfect day; 
Nor sink those stars in empty night, 
They hide themselves in heaven's own light. 

— James Montgomery. 

The Radiant Shore 

Will they meet us, cheer and greet us, 
Those we've loved, who've gone before? 

Shall we find them at the portals, 

Find our beautiful immortals, 

When we reach the radiant shore? 

381 



AFTER DEATH— WHAT? 

Hearts are broken, for some token 
That they live and love us yet! 
And we ask, can those who left us, 
Of love's look and tone bereft us, 
Though in heaven, can they forget? 

And we often, as days soften, • 
And comes out the evening star, 

Looking westward, sit and wonder 

Whether, when so far asunder 

They still think how dear they are! 

Past yon portals, our immortals, 
Those who walk with him in white, 

Do they, 'raid their bliss, recall us? 

Know they what events befall us? 
Will our coming wake delight? 

They will meet us, cheer and greet us, 
Those we've loved, who've gone before; 

We shall find them at the portals, 

Find our beautiful immortals, 

When we reach that radiant shore! 

Over the River 

Over the river they beckon to me, 

Loved ones who've crossed to the further side; 
The gleams of their snowy robes I see. 

But, their voices are lost in the rushing tide. 
There's one with ringlets of sunny gold, 

And eyes, the reflection of heaven's own blue; 
He crossed in the twilight gray and cold, 

And the pale mist hid him from mortal view: 
We saw not the angel that met him there, 

The gates of the city we could not see — 
Over the river, over the river, 

My brother stands waiting to welcome me. 

Over the river the boatman pale, 

Carried another, the household pet; 
Her brown curls wave in the gentle gale, 

Darling Minnie! I see her yet. 
She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands, 

And fearlessly entered the phantom bark ; 
We felt it glide from the silver sands, 

And all our sunshine grew strangely dark; 
We know she is safe on the other side, 

Where all the ransomed and angels be — 
Over the river, the mystic river, 

My childhood's idol is waiting for me. 

382 



REUNIONS IN HEAVEN 

For none return from those quiet shores, 

Who cross with the boatman cold and pale, 
We hear the dip of their golden oars, 

And catch a glimpse of their snowy sail ; 
And lo, they have passed from our yearning hearts, 

They cross the stream and are lost for aye. 
We may not sunder the veil apart, 

That hides from our vision the gates of day. 
We only know that the barks no more 

May sail with us o'er life's stormy sea; 
Yet, somewhere I know, on the unseen shore, 

They watch, and beckon, and wait for me. 

And I sit and think where the sunset's gold, 

Is flushing river, and hill, and shore, 
I shall one day stand by the waters cold, 

And list for the sound of the boatman's oar; 
I shall watch for the gleam of the flapping sail, 

I shall hear the boat as it gains the strand, 
I shall pass from sight with the boatman pale, 

To the better shore of the spirit land; 
I shall know the loved that have gone before, 

And joyfully sweet will the meeting be, 
When over the river, the peaceful river, 

The angel of death shall carry me. — Nancy Priest, 



Index of Authors 



INDEX OF AUTHORS 



PAGE 

Abbott, Lyman, 134, 135 

Addison, Joseph, 27, 35 

iEschylus, 307 

Akers, Mrs. J. E., 80, 367, 368 

Alder, Rabbi Herman, 67 

Alford, Henry, 53 

Argyle, Duke of 132 

Aristotle, 275 

Arnold, Sir Edwin, 54 

Barbauld, Mrs., 172 

Bascom, Dr. John, 127 

Baumgarten, Siegmund Jacob, 60 

Beale, Dr. Lionel, 127 

Beecher, Henry Ward, 153, 154, 334, 335 

Bickersteth, Edward Henry, 370, 371 

Bonar, Horatius, . . . 215, 246, 315, 316, 351, 357, 358 

Bradford, Dr. Amory, 156, 157 

Brooks, Phillips, 129 

Browning, Robert, 45, 91, 267, 333 

Bryan, William Jennings, 165, 166 

Bryant, William Cullen, 25, 347 

Byron, Lord, 20, 248 

Cary,Phcebe, 79 

Carlyle, Thomas, 22, 76, 134 

Cicero, 25, 41, 45, 276, 308, 309 

Clark, James Allen, 356, 357 

Cobbe, Frances Power, 132, 133 

Coleridge, T. C, 55, 125 

Cooke, Joseph, ..... 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153 

Cranch, Christopher Pearse, 348, 349 

Cyprian, . . . 320 

387 



INDEX OF AUTHORS 

PAGE 

Daniel, 71 

David, 68, 322, 323 

Delitzsch, Adolf Franz, 61 

Democritus, 22 

Dickinson, Emily, 20 

Douglas, Fred, 115 

Edmeston, James, 377 

Eliot, George, 20 

Elizabeth, Queen, 30 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 21, 136, 331, 332 

Epictetus, 22 

Erskine, Lord-Chancellor, 125, 126 

Ezekiel, 65 

Fawcett, John, 315 

Fiske,John, 21, 126, 127, 159, 160, 161 

Fleming, Paul, 358, 359 

Foster, Bishop Randolph S., . . 145, 146, 147, 148, 270 

George, William Potts, 168 

Gerlach, Otto von 60 

Gladden, Washington, 161, 162 

Goethe, Johann W. von 44, 138 

Gordon, Dr. George, 130, 131 

Harnack, Prof., 166 

Havergal, Frances Ridley, 352 

Hemans, Mrs. F. D., 351, 352 

Herford, Dr. Brooke, 131, 132 

Herschell, Sir John, 35 

Hobart, Mrs. Charles, 108 

Homer, 306, 307 

Hosmer, Frederick L., 378 

Hugo, Victor, 43, 44, 133, 134 

Humboldt, 278, 279 

Huntington, Frederick D., 368 

Isaiah, 69 

Jacob, 113 

James, Prof. William, 138 

383 



INDEX OF AUTHORS 

PAGE 

Job, 58, 70 

Johnson, Herrick, ........ ... 188 

Judson, Dr. Adoniram, .... 336, 337, 338, 339, 340 

Kant, Emmanuel 45 

Knobel, Karl August, 60 

Lange, J., 378, 379 

Leggett, William, 30& 

Livingston, David, 23 

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, . . 20, 102, 197, 198, 269 

Lowell, James Russell, 45, 211, 212 

Luke, 59 

Lytton, Bulwer, 269, 270 

McConnell, Dr. S. D., 137 

MacDonald, George, 48 

MacKellan, Thomas, 101 

Maclagen, William D., . 245 

Mant, Bishop, 330, 381 

March, Daniel, , 163, 164 

Martineau, 20, 128 

Mills, Mrs. Elizabeth, 370 

Milton, John, 88 

Montgomery, James, 381 

Moses, 225 

Muhlenberg, William Augustus, 316 

Munger, Dr. Theodore T., 135, 136, 331 

Neander, J. August Wilhelm, . . . . . 318, 319, 320 

Newman, Cardinal, 315 

Norton, Andrew, 355 

Newton, Sir Isaac, 279 

Parker, Theodore, 29, 45 

Paul, .... 75, 113, 181, 226, 296, 324, 325, 326, 327 

Phillips, Wendell, 117 

Plato, 275, 291 

Pollock, Edward, 350, 351 

Pope, Alexander, 315 

Porphyry, 314 

Priest, Nancy, 383 

389 



INDEX OF AUTHORS 

PAGE 

Procter, Adelaide, 268 

Pythagoras, 249 

Robertson, Dr., 313 

Renan, Joseph Ernest, 41 

Romanes, George, 137 

Rosetti, Christina, 332 

St. Ambrose, 321, 322 

St. Augustine 322 

St. Jerome, 322 

St. John, . 182, 220, 221, 222, 226, 253, 257, 289, 294, 324 

St. Teresa of Spain, 171 

Salmond, Dr., 136, 137 

Samuel, 63, 65 

Schiller, Johann, C. F., 27 

Schlegel, Friederich, 21 

Scott, Sir Walter, 55 

Seneca, 143, 144, 145 

Shakespeare, William, 97, 331 

Shaler, Dr. N. S., 129 

Shelley, Percy B., 37 

Smith, Prof. Goldwin, . 158, 159 

Smythe, Dr. Newman 135 

Socrates, 274, 275, 307, 308 

Sophocles, 307 

Southey, Robert, 279, 280, 333, 334 

Sprague, Charles, 19, 371, 372 

Stedman, Edmund Clarence, 366 

Sterling, John, 76 

Stoddard, Richard Henry, 28 

Tennyson, Alfred, . 20, 29, 47, 49, 91, 210, 211, 279, 332 

[333, 335 

Thomas, Dr. H. W., 139, 140, 141 

Trail, William, 142, 143 

Ulrich, Anton, (Duke of Brunswick,) .... 359,360 
Upham, Thomas C, 359 

Virgil, 309, 310, 311, 312 

390 



INDEX OF AUTHORS 

PAGE 

Wendling, Geo., 154, 155, 156 

Wesley, John, 316 

White, H. K., 380 

Whittier, John Greenleaf , . 49, 335, 336, 348, 349, 350, 354 

Wilcox, Ella Wheeler, 38 

Winkworth, Catherine, 358, 359, 360 

Yates, John H., 365 

Yorke, Laurenstine, 353 

Young, Edward, 54, 82 



First Lines of Poems or of Poetical 
Quotations 



FIRST LINES OF POEMS OR OF 
POETICAL QUOTATIONS 



PAGE 

And shall I e'er again thy features trace, .... 380 

And the mother gone; in tears and pain, .... 197 

And yet, dear heart remembering thee, 335 

A picture memory brings to me, 353 

As thro' the land at eve we went, 211 

As thy day thy strength shall be, 352 

At evening time let there be light, 380 

Attempt, how monstrous and how surely vain, ... 32 

Away with death — away, 379 

Beyond the stars that shine in golden glory, . . . 368 

Beyond life's toils and cares, 367 

Bright in that happy land, . 332 

But in my spirit will I dwell, 47 

Come, let us join our friends above, 316 

Could we but know, 366 

Dear friend far-off, my lost desire, 333 

Death with his healing hand, 375 

Did He not to his followers say, 79 

Far o'er yon horizon, 53 

Fliest thou, loved shade while I thus fondly mourn, . 306 

For every cloud, a silvery light, 355 

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place, . . 20 

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, . . 97 

Four sprightly coursers, with a deadly groan, . . . 307 

Friend after friend departs, 381 

God gives us love, . . 210 

God within the shadow, 113 

Have we not all, amid earth's petty strife, .... 268 

Heaven is the prize, ,«,... 227 

395 



FIRST LINES OF POEMS 

PAGE 

Here found they Teucer's, old heroic race, . . . . 311 

He saw friends, who, whelmed beneath the waves, . . 309 

He, with his guide, the farther fields attain, . . . 311 

How blest the righteous when he dies, 172 

How long? 351 

I cannot think of them as dead, 378 

If e'er when faith had fallen asleep, 332 

If yon bright stars which gem the night, .... 304 

I long for household voices gone, 347 

It bids us do the work that they laid down, . . . . 121 

I feel my immortality o'ersweeps, 20 

I felt instantly, 211 

I know this earth is not my sphere, 45 

I see thee still, 371 

Island valley of Avilion 251 

It must be so, Plato, thou reason'st well, .... 27 

It was a time of sadness — and my heart, .... 109 

I weary of this endless strife, ........ 171 

Leave all to God, 359 

Leona, the hour draws nigh, 356 

Let nothing make thee sad or fretful, 358 

Life is like a wild iEolian harp of many a joyous strain, 111 

Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutored mind, . . . 315 

Mark how yon clouds in darkness rise, 19 

Meets him with open arms and falling tear, . . . 312 

Men may come and men may go, 24 

My God, I thank Thee: may no thought, .... 355 

My God, it is not fretfulness, 351 

No life that breathes with human breath, .... 29 

No moaning of the bar; sail forth, strong ship, . . 54 

No night shall be in heaven, no gathering gloom, . . 261 

No shadows yonder, 246 

Oh, deem not they are blest alone, 347 

Oh, my deep dungeon ! my eternal home, 307 

O, may I join the choir invisible, 20 

Our beloved have departed, 378 

Our buried friends can we forget, 336 

Ours is the grief, who still are left in this far wilderness, 370 

Over the river they beckon to me, 382 

Part, in sleep away, 91 

396 



FIRST LINES OF POEMS 

PAGE 

Reach forth your hand, oh parent shade, nor shun, . 312 

Shrink not from sufferings. Each dear blow, . . . . 359 

Spin cheerfully, 354 

Still seems it strange that thou should'st live forever, . 54 

Sudden arose, . 37 

Surely you heaven, where angels see God's face, . . 215 

Tears wash away the atoms in the eye, 348 

The day is cold, and dark and dreary, 102 

The element's rage, the fiend voices that rave, . . . 333 

The gloomiest day hath gleams of light, 351 

The islands of the blest they say, 248 

The life of man, 28 

The Lord shall come, the earth shall quake, . . . 191 

The men of grace have found, 98 

The night is gone, . 315 

The pain we have to suffer seems so broad, .... 38 

The pilgrim of a day, 41 

The saints of God their wanderings done, .... 245 

The soul secure in her existence, smiles, 35 

There comes a time in the lives of men, 353 

There is a land immortal, 101 

There is a land where beauty will not fade, . . . 216 

There is no death ! The stars go down, 269 

There is no death — what seems so is transition, . . 269 

There is no flock, however watched and tended, . . 198 

There is no night in heaven, 368 

There no parting, no more pain, 332 

There the saints of all ages in harmony meet, . . . 316 

There's something in the parting hour, 350 

Think'st beauty vanished from the coast, .... 332 

This may not be, I cried — and looked again, . . . 110 

This precious Book, I'd rather have, 55 

This truth came borne with bier and pall, . 49 

This world is not conclusion, 20 

Tho' I stoop, 91 

Thou art not dead; in thy higher sphere, .... 45 

Throw thyself on thy God, 35 

Thy way, not mine, O Lord! 352 

Time is fleeting, 82 

'Tis but one family — the sound is balm, 377 

'Tis immortality, 'tis that alone, 82 

'Tis sorrow builds the shining ladder up, .... 212 

Truth forever on the scaffold, 113 

Two weary hearts, two mourning homes, .... 349 

397 



FIRST LINES OP POEMS 

PAGE 

Verdict which accumulates, 332 

We are quite sure, 303 

We part on this green islet, Love, 338 

We're going home, we've had visions bright, .... 363 

We speak of the realms of the blest, . . . . . . 370 

What is left for us, save in growth of soul to rise, . . 267 

When all our hopes are gone, 122 

When we asunder part, 315 

Where none shall beckon us away, 315 

Who would not go, .366 

Why do we mourn, when another star, 345 

Will they meet us, cheer and greet us, 381 

Yes, if it 'twere only a dream, 28 

Yet love will dream and faith will trust, 49 



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